Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions — WALES

Overseas Promotion

Mr. Gwynfor Evans: asked the Secretary of State for Wales if he is satisfied with the way in which bodies financed or sponsored by the Government promote the interests of Wales in other countries.

The Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. John Morris): Yes.

Mr. Evans: Will the Secretary of State take the initiative in co-ordinating the industrial, commercial and tourist bodies in Wales with a view to establishing, with Government financial assistance, an attractive centre in London which would be a focal point of Welsh interests and which would further them? Does he agree

that it would be a good thing if such a centre compared well with the one for Scotland just opened near Trafalgar Square and those which other countries, such as Ireland and Iceland, have?

Mr. Morris: This suggestion has been made before. I shall draw it to the attention of the Development Corporation of Wales and the Welsh Development Agency.

Mr. Kinnock: Does not my right hon. and learned Friend agree that in recent months the promotional activities of the Welsh Development Agency, especially in its Press publicity and promotional folders, has been quite excellent? Indeed, it is improving all the time. However, will he give consideration to the idea of setting up a Libyan-Welsh friendship association which could probably concentrate on the sale of Welsh sheep to Libya, as suggested by Plaid Cymru a couple of years ago?

Mr. Morris: Fortunately, the external relationships between the nationalist party and whoever is in charge in Libya are not my responsibility. I recall that suggestion being made some years ago, but by the end of the silly season it seemed to have disappeared out of sight.

Job Creation

Mr. Wigley: asked the Secretary of State for Wales how many applications have been received by the Manpower Services Commission in Wales to date for


financial assistance towards projects under the youth opportunities programme and the special temporary employment programme; and how many jobs are associated with these projects, respectively.

Mr. John Morris: I am informed by the Manpower Services Commission in Wales that, during April this year, it received 312 applications which would provide 717 places in the youth opportunities programme and 13 applications providing 134 places in the special temporary employment programme for adults.

Mr. Wigley: Is the Secretary of State aware that, whereas the youth opportunities programme appears to have got off to a reasonable start, the STEP seems to be well below the level of activity in the job creation scheme 12 months previously? I am in no way criticising the performance of the Welsh Office or the Welsh unit of the Manpower Services Commission, because this is a British problem arising from reorganisation. Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman look into this matter to see whether it is possible to get a greater dynamism in order to bring to the attention of potential sponsors the opportunities that exist under the STEP?

Mr. Morris: The detailed application of this programme is a matter for the Manpower Services Commission. The Government have supplied a large amount of money for the area boards to operate. The success of these schemes will depend upon the co-operation and willingness of industry, local authorities and all sorts of bodies to devise and sponsor schemes. I take cognisance of the hon. Gentleman's remarks. I do not accept that there is falling back, but I shall watch very carefully to see how this programme develops, certainly from September.

Mr. Nicholas Edwards: Do not the figures given recently by Ministers for the total number of jobs provided under the various job creation schemes show that there are now about 150,000 people in Wales, including a very large number of young people, who are unemployed, without permanent jobs, or without jobs that offer long-term prospects? Is that what the Secretary of State meant when before the last General Election he spoke about "back to work with Labour"?

Mr. Morris: If the hon. Gentleman is responsible, as I hope he is, I hope that he will not pour cold water over the enormous efforts that have been made in a whole series of measures to provide employment for people. If he wants to see more people on the dole, without hope, then, of course, he will do that. But we have provided a large number of job opportunities—about 60,000—for people in Wales. I hope very much that the programme which the hon. Member for Caernarvon (Mr. Wigley) welcomed a few moments ago will provide increased provision for young people in the course of the coming year. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will withdraw any suggestion that that is not an important facet of life which is welcomed in Wales, because it is sorely needed.

Mr. Nicholas Edwards: I hope that the right hon. and learned Gentleman is not suggesting that they are permanent jobs. Will not he agree that a total of 89,000 people out of work plus those in temporary jobs is a pretty bleak prospect for the young people of Wales?

Mr. Morris: I have said all along that these figures are appallingly high. But I am confident that the public expenditure proposals of the hon. Member for Pembroke (Mr. Edwards) and those which he campaigns for and advocates here—although he is the first to speak out for expenditure in his own area—if his party ever came to power, would mean a substantial increase in unemployment because the Conservatives would slash public expenditure right across the line, especially in Wales.

Hospital Building

Mr. Kinnock: asked the Secretary of State for Wales what proposals he has for major hospital extensions and new hospital building over the next five years.

The Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Barry Jones): My right hon. and learned Friend's aim is to bring into operation the schemes at Rhyl and at Bangor and to make a start on the next round of major hospital developments for the 1980s which were announced in December 1976 at Bridgend, Llanelli, Wrexham Maelor, Morriston and St. Woolos, Gwent. In addition, we are discussing with authorities the detailed content of a programme of other schemes costing up to £1 million each.

Mr. Kinnock: Although I acknowledge the general need for extensive hospital improvements throughout Wales, will not my hon. Friend accept that we have been waiting a very long time for and had promises on two occasions of a new district general hospital to serve West Gwent and that consultative opinion and general practitioner opinion have now joined other opinions in those areas to emphasise the desperate need for such hospital provision to cut waiting lists, to provide new means and to relieve my constituents and others of the enormous costs of travel as out-patients and visitors to these hospitals?

Mr. Barry Jones: My hon. Friend has campaigned for a long time on this issue. However, the Gwent Area Health Authority advised that priority should be given to the development of the Royal Gwent and St. Woolos hospitals. Scheme 5 of the Royal Gwent developments will be completed later this year, and the scheme at St. Woolos is at an advanced stage of planning. I can tell my hon. Friend specifically that the long-term objective of the area health authority is a third district general hospital to serve the western part of Gwent.

Sir A. Meyer: Is the hon. Gentleman yet in a position to give any idea of the latest expected date for the operation of the district general hospital at Rhyl?

Mr. Barry Jones: I should need notice of that question to give a detailed answer, but I estimate that some time next year is the hoped-for date.

Mr. Gwynfor Evans: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that, because of greatly increased pressure, the facilities now at the West Wales General Hospital at Carmarthen are gravely inadequate and that if the position continues to be neglected it could become critical? Is he further aware that this is the only acute hospital in Wales which lacks an intensive care unit?

Mr. Barry Jones: Other parts of Dyfed are saying stridently that they should be the first in the queue for available money for development. The Withybush scheme, which is a £7 million development, will be coming on stream this year, which will help the area of Dyfed and to some degree the hon. Member's constituency.

Mr. Anderson: Can my hon. Friend confirm in terms that his announcement means that the new development at Morriston hospital will take place at the time originally envisaged and that there is no delay, as was feared some months ago?

Mr. Barry Jones: We envisage no slippage, and I hope that authority to invite tenders for some of the schemes can be given by 1979. However, a final decision cannot be taken until the very detailed planning needed has been completed and there has been full and thorough consideration of the fairest and most equitable way to proceed.

Housing

Mr. Wyn Roberts: asked the Secretary of State for Wales how many houses were started in Wales in the public and private sectors in the first quarter of 1978; and if he is satisfied with the figures.

The Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Alec Jones): About 1,500 houses were started in the public sector and 1,450 in the private sector. These figures are significantly higher than those for the corresponding quarter of 1977, but I reserve judgment on whether the level is adequate until I have had an opportunity to study the housing strategy statements and investment programmes which are now coming in from all housing authorities.

Mr. Roberts: I am grateful to the Minister for those figures. However, he has to realise that the annual rate which those figures imply is even lower than the annual rate last year, which was the worst year for house building since 1959. What do the Government intend to do about it? What encouragement is the hon. Gentleman giving to house builders in both sectors?

Mr. Alec Jones: Among the matters which should be taken into account is that the limiting factor on house building in the public sector in Wales during the past two years has not been the failure of the Government to allocate resources. In two consecutive years it has been the failure of housing authorities, for one reason or another, to take up and use all the money allocated for that purpose.

Mr. Anderson: Given that underspend on the public sector side to which my


hon. Friend has drawn attention, can he say what lessons the Welsh Office has learnt in terms of closer liaison with local authorities to ensure that the underspend which has occurred over the past two years does not continue in future?

Mr. Alec Jones: I hope that not only will the lessons of the past two years be learnt but that the fact that we have now set up the Welsh Housing Consultative Committee will give us the sort of liaison and co-operation between the Welsh Office Housing Division and local authorities in Wales to which my hon. Friend refers. But it is important to recognise that no authority in Wales this year has had any scheme cut out from the programmes which the authorities submitted to us in November.

Mr. Wigley: In view of what the Minister has just said, can he confirm that no authority will be held back from any house construction scheme because it is approaching the limits of its provisional allocation of finance, in line with what he told Dwyfor District Council last summer for the last financial year? Can the hon. Gentleman also indicate whether there is any updating of the cost yardstick data on which housing plans are judged, in view of the very tight nature of these yardsticks in rural areas?

Mr. Alec Jones: As regards building this year, every housing authority in Wales submitted its physical programme to us and we told each of them that it could carry on and build the whole of its programme. Now the responsibility is on the local authorities to show that they can use the money available.
The question of the yardstick has been raised with me on several occasions. However, if one examines the tenders which are coming in, one sees that the evidence presented by those tenders indicates that the cost yardstick is not proving a serious obstacle in those parts of Wales which have submitted evidence to me. However, if any hon. Member has further evidence which he cares to submit to me, I shall certainly want to look at it, because in fact we have increased the cost yardstick every quarter since 1975.

Mr. Kinnock: Is my hon. Friend aware that gazumping is back in Wales and that it is being practised most maliciously by house construction companies in the

private sector which, in my constituency and probably in others, have put up house prices by as much as £2,000 and £2,500 to prospective purchasers, thereby causing great distress whilst undertaking great profiteering? Has my hon. Friend any suggestions which could be introduced in law to prevent companies from engaging in practices of this kind?

Mr. Alec Jones: I shall be grateful to my hon. Friend if he can give me details of some specific cases, because it is difficult to talk about these subjects in general terms. But, of course, one reason why the building society lending levels were reduced was to discourage the sort of activity to which my hon. Friend has referred.

Literacy and Numeracy

Mr. Michael Roberts: asked the Secretary of State for Wales what proposals he has to improve standards of literacy and numeracy in Wales.

Mr. Barry Jones: An improvement in standards of literacy and numeracy in the schools of Wales demands concerted action by all the partners in the education service.
I sought to give a lead at the Mold conference and elsewhere, and now intend following this up vigorously in a series of further meetings with local education authorities, teachers and others.

Mr. Roberts: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that a National Coal Board spokesman said recently that between 10 per cent. and 15 per cent. of young applicants for jobs in the NCB were rejected as being virtually unemployable in terms of literacy and numeracy? Will he take vigorous steps to ensure that the youth of Wales have the advantage of improved standards and, consequently, the opportunity of getting jobs?

Mr. Barry Jones: I should like to see details of the NCB report and perhaps to have the observations of the hon. Member for Cardiff, North-West (Mr. Roberts), who has a distinguished record in the education sevice. However, employers are seeking all the time higher standards from the young people of Wales. At the same time, I would not wish it to be thought that my Department was in any way complacent. We are already taking very positive action. There is to be an


inquiry into the teaching of mathematics, and the Assessment of Performance Unit is urgently developing better instruments for assessing pupils' attainment. The tests for mathematics and reading are already being mounted in Wales.

Mr. Gwynfor Evans: Can the Minister say whether there is any evidence of deficiency in either literacy or numeracy in Welsh language schools?

Mr. Barry Jones: I should like to have notice of such a detailed question. However, I say immediately that I am not aware of a decline in standards.

Mr. Wyn Roberts: Now that the Secretary of State has, from 1st April, taken over responsibility for teacher training and supply, does he have plans to improve teacher training in Wales?

Mr. Barry Jones: There is no doubt that I shall be having discussions throughout Wales on the assessment of how the teacher training establishments in Wales might contribute towards the attainment of better standards of literacy and numeracy.

Industrial Development and Tourism

Sir A. Meyer: asked the Secretary of State for Wales what representation he has received from local authorities in Wales regarding the present boundaries of assisted areas for industrial development in Wales and for aid to the tourist industry.

Mr. John Morris: Since the beginning of 1977 I have received representations from nine local authorities in Wales regarding the present boundaries of assisted areas and from five local authorities regarding aid to the tourist industry.

Sir A. Meyer: Is the Minister satisfied with an arrangement whereby areas such as Rhyl, in my constituency, which has the highest level of male unemployment, receive the least amount of Government aid and, in particular, no aid at all for their tourist industry? Would it not be very much better to do away with special development areas, intermediate areas and so on and treat the whole of Wales as one development area?

Mr. Morris: I do not think that the hon. Gentleman would receive a great deal of approval in the House if he were to convince me that it was the right thing to do, unless he is an advocate, which I am sure he is not, of building an Offa's Dyke to separate Wales from the rest of the United Kingdom. There are different areas in Wales and there are different areas in England. We seek to ensure—though boundaries are a matter for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Industry—that the areas with the gravest problems in terms of numbers and proportions receive the maximum aid. However, we are constantly looking at the areas without the major aids. The area mentioned by the hon. Gentleman is in an intermediate area.

Mr. Wigley: Does the Secretary of State accept that, as the definition of grants for industrial purposes has been more or less static for the past 10 or 12 years, the time may now be appropriate to consider the definitions of "industrial" and "service" for the purposes of defining grants in order to do away with the artificial differentiation between one type of job and another, particularly in areas where there have been difficulties in developing jobs?

Mr. Morris: This is a matter primarily for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Industry. However, he and I are concerned to ensure that the money available is used to the best possible advantage to ensure the maximum number of jobs. But the danger is that the greater the area and the wider the classification, the less the value of any inducements that are offered.

Mr. John Ellis: Does my right hon. and learned Friend find that in Wales the labour exchange areas are not always the best areas to take for these purposes? Has he had any talks with his Scottish and English fellow Ministers with a view to getting a more workable system that has more relevance than the old labour exchange area had?

Mr. Morris: I have tried in Wales to concentrate our policies on the travel-to-work areas. However, I am not aware that the matter raised by my hon. Friend is a significant problem across Wales, though there are one or two areas in which problems might arise.

Kepone

Mr. Abse: asked the Secretary of State for Wales what discussions he has had on the issue of the incineration of kepone at the Re-chem factory in Pontypool; and whether he will make a statement.

Mr. John Morris: I am in continuous touch with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment, and my Department is maintaining close liaison with the Health and Safety Executive.

Mr. Abse: In the representations that I trust the Secretary of State is making, will he emphasise to the Secretary of State for the Environment, as he is contemplating whether to allow the importation of this material, that when no State of the United States of America will permit the incineration of kepone upon its soil, the whole community of my valley is determined not to become the guinea pigs?
Will the Secretary of State explain to the Secretary of State for the Environment that in Wales, where we are just clearing away the debris created by British capitalism in the last industrial revolution, no area will be more resistant to the idea that the reckless and irresponsible consequences of American capitalism should now be dumped into the middle of our valley?

Mr. Morris: My hon. Friend has made representations to me, to my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary and I am sure to others on this subject. He will be aware that the proposal at present is subject to a Health and Safety Executive prohibition notice which will not be lifted until my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment and I are completely satisfied that the disposal can go ahead without causing any environmental damage. I am fully aware of the position outlined by my hon. Friend.

School Leavers

Mr. Grist: asked the Secretary of State for Wales what estimate his Department has of the number of school leavers for 1978 who will be entering the labour market in (a) Wales and (b) the county of South Glamorgan.

Mr. John Morris: Estimates based on the results of last year's 10 per cent. sample survey of Welsh school leavers suggest that the figures will be of the order of 34,000 for Wales and 5,000 for South Glamorgan.

Mr. Grist: Does the Secretary of State appreciate that in South Glamorgan there is a desperate shortage of jobs in the manufacturing sectors for youngsters leaving school? Does he not agree that the best way to create new jobs for them is to encourage private industry to make more and bigger profits, and for private individuals to be able to keep more post-tax income in order to create incentives?

Mr. Morris: We are giving every encouragement to private industry. We are giving every encouragement to small business, through the efforts of the Welsh Development Agency and others. We are also—I hope that the hon. Gentleman will welcome this—embarking on a major programme of advance factory building in his area.

Mr. Geraint Howells: I am sure that the Secretary of State for Wales is aware of the high unemployment figure in my constituency, especially in Cardigan, Llandyssul and Lampeter. What plans has he in mind to help the school leavers who will be leaving school at the end of this term?

Mr. Morris: In the Manpower Services Commission there are three area boards which will be considering the needs of school leavers who will not have found jobs in the ordinary course of events. Those area boards will be setting up their training programmes. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman is aware of the number of advance factories that I have announced in his constituency and the success that the Development Board for Rural Wales has had in recent weeks and months in letting factories right across the board in Mid-Wales.

National Health Service

Mr. Nicholas Edwards: asked the Secretary of State for Wales what extra resources are made available to the National Health Service in Wales to cater for the exceptional levels of sickness, injury and impairment found there.

Mr. Barry Jones: The special needs of the National Health Service in Wales are reflected in the fact that expenditure per head is more than 3 per cent. above the average for England over the period covered by the latest White Paper on public expenditure. Some expenditure on the NHS in England is also of benefit to Wales.

Mr. Edwards: Is it not a fact that the number of days lost due to sickness in Wales is double that in England? Is it not true that about 30 per cent. more prescriptions are issued in Wales and that Wales suffers from more industrial accidents and much higher levels of impairment, regrettably, than England? Is the hon. Gentleman satisfied that the additional resources allocated per head are adequate to meet those exceptional needs in the Welsh context?

Mr. Barry Jones: I am never satisfied about the amount of money available for the National Health Service in Wales. There is no established measure of health need. However, because the Government are dissatisfied with the inherited distribution of resources among authorities in England, Scotland and Wales, working groups are set up in each country to consider the matter. Their report suggests that there are disparities in existing resource distribution which the Government want to remove as quickly as resources will permit.

Mr. Kinnock: Does not my hon. Friend accept that one of the reasons for repeated visits to GPs, as an indicator of morbidity in the community, is the fact that we have not enough hospitals to provide curative treatment for people with diseases, notably respiratory and cardiac diseases? Will he pay more attention to that matter and to the fact that we have the highest infant mortality rate of any area of the United Kingdom? Will he perhaps sponsor additional research, which is very expensive, into the matter?

Mr. Barry Jones: I am in agreement with the main points made by my hon. Friend. Late in 1977 the Welsh Office sponsored a morbidity seminar at which we investigated the problems to which my hon. Friend has referred. We in the Welsh Office are sensitive to the problems arising from our industrial heritage of the past century.

Mr. Hooson: Does the Minister accept that one of the reasons for our high National Health Service expenditure in Wales lies in the fact that in many areas there is a pattern of ageing population? Does he realise that many people have moved to Wales in retirement and that the percentage of people over the ages of 60 and 65 is higher than in other parts of the United Kingdom? Has there been a survey on this aspect?

Mr. Barry Jones: There are always surveys being made on these matters concerning the National Health Service in Wales. I know that the hon. Member for Cardigan (Mr. Howells) will be sorry to have missed asking his Question, but I can tell him that there is currently a capital building programme in Wales of £24 million and that for the early 1980s we expect that there will be a building programme of about £31 million.

Advance Factories

Mr. Anderson: asked the Secretary of State for Wales how many advance factories have been allocated in the current year and if he will make a statement.

Mr. John Morris: To date in 1978, 53 advance factories have been formally or provisionally allocated covering over ½ million sq. ft. to provide an estimated 2,740 jobs. In the corresponding period last year, the total was 13 factories covering 192,000 sq. ft. to provide 750 jobs.

Mr. Anderson: Is my right hon. and learned Friend aware that those figures, showing an increase year on year, will be very welcome? Can he also confirm that, looking at the past six months, we are also on a rising trend in terms of advance factory allocation?

Mr. Morris: I hope that I shall be able to satisfy my hon. Friend on that point. I shall be announcing today the letting of 12 advance factories—a substantial total to announce in one day. The numbers of inquiries and applications for selective assistance have risen substantially as compared with the same period last year. We are certainly on a rising trend.

Mr. Grist: May I ask the Secretary of State to tell me whether one of the 12 factories which he is to announce today is the 50,000 sq. ft. factory at Pentwyn,


in my constituency, as he has been saying for over three years that he has been expecting to be able to let it at any moment?

Mr. Morris: That factory is not being announced today as having been let. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that a factory of that size is certainly an attractive proposition, and I am anxious that we get a suitable tenant for it.

Mr. Wigley: Does not the Secretary of State realise that something over 2,000 jobs in advance factories at a time when we have 90,000 people unemployed is totally unsatisfactory? Has he seen an article in a recent issue of New Scientist which contained a devastating analysis of the failure of the advance factory programme in Gwynedd? When will the Government tackle the problem?

Mr. Morris: The hon. Gentleman should realise that advance factories are only a part of the answer to the problem. It would be churlish of the hon. Gentleman not to welcome the fact that 2,740 jobs are expected in a matter of months. The other side of the coin is the enormous efforts the Government are making to decentralise Government Departments and send jobs to Wales. It is odd that the hon. Gentleman should campaign for more jobs for Wales yet his party should be against the decentralisation of Government Departments, particularly the move of the Ministry of Defence to Cardiff.

Oral Answers to Questions — INDUSTRY

Regional Policy

Mr. Kenneth Clarke: asked the Secretary of State for Industry whether he will make a statement on the future of his Department's regional policy.

The Under-Secretary of State for Industry (Mr. Bob Cryer): The Government remain firmly committed to their regional policy. The Department of Industry, in close co-operation with the other Departments concerned, continues to promote investment and employment in the assisted areas.

Mr. Clarke: Will the Minister give details of the pay policy conditions now being attached to offers of regional assistance which are threatening 1,000 jobs at

Schreibers, at Runcorn New Town, and no doubt many other jobs in assisted areas elsewhere? Can the hon. Gentleman tell us whether such conditions are now being attached to every offer of assistance under regional policy and, if so, can he say what is the authority in law for attaching those conditions to offers of assistance to projects which in every other respect satisfy the criteria of the Industry Act 1972?

Mr. Cryer: The matter raised by the hon. Member is one for negotiation which is currently under way. He would hardly expect me to embark on a detailed explanation of the negotiations which are generally confidential to the Department of Industry. The Department's policy remains firm and fixed, namely, that we shall try to use our best endeavours to promote regional policy and bring jobs to the regions.

Mr. Radice: May I thank my hon. Friend for his reaffirmation of the Government's support for regional policy Does he agree that if the Conservatives had their way and regional incentives were cut the impact on areas such as the North-East would be disastrous?

Mr. Cryer: That is certainly true. In 1976–77, the Government spent almost £720 million on regional assistance. It is interesting that Opposition Front Bench spokesmen and many other Conservatives have called for cuts in public expenditure while at the same time many Tories plead for more money for their constituencies. Earlier this afternoon, we heard two Conservative Members representing Welsh seats pleading for more money for the National Health Service, while one Tory Member representing a Welsh seat wanted the whole of Wales to be turned into a special development area. The Opposition ought to get their priorities sorted out.

Mr. Clarke: Will the Minister say whether the pay policy conditions are now being attached to all offers of regional assistance and, if so, what is the authority in law for that? The hon. Gentleman is in no way inhibited, because of his negotiations with Schreibers, from answering those important general questions.

Mr. Cryer: If the hon. Member will table specific questions on this point, we shall give specific answers.

Mr. William Hamilton: In view of events last week, whereby the Conservative Opposition sought to reduce tax revenue, which led to the Government saying that they would seek to raise that revenue by putting up employers' national insurance contributions, may I ask the Government to use that revenue-raising method on a differential regional basis in place of the regional employment premium, which was abolished recently?

Mr. Cryer: As my hon. Friend has pointed out, the Conservative Opposition want it all ways. They seek further public expenditure and the reduction of taxes for the well-off. I shall bring my hon. Friend's points to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Chancellor.

Mr. Sproat: Is the Minister aware that the case for a radical reform of regional policy is nowhere better illustrated than in the Aberdeen area? Does he realise that in the Aberdeen area oil and oil-related companies, which would locate there irrespective of whatever inducements the Government offered, are still capable of attracting Government aid whereas non-oil companies are now prevented by the Government from drawing the full amount of aid that is available to the same type of companies in other areas?

Mr. Cryer: The Government are always looking at regional policy to see by which means it can be best applied. We understand that there are certain circumstances which create difficulties, although I do not accept that the hon. Member has raised any. We are constantly re-examining regional policy. We believe that, by and large, in a difficult situation with a recession affecting other European countries, if we did not have our regional aid policy the regions would be far and away worse off.

Industry Act Assistance

Mr. Silvester: asked the Secretary of State for Industry to what extent local business experience is employed in assessing assistance under the Industry Act.

Mr. Cryer: As our criteria describe, local and national industrial implications are taken into account in appraising applications for selective assistance. The local industrial context is provided

through the Government's regional centres which cover all localities in the United Kingdom and maintain continuing contacts with the development and needs of industry in their areas. These offices include among their staff business men on secondment. For the main assisted areas, where structural problems and unemployment are at their most serious, the bulk of proposals are placed before independent regional industrial development boards, whose membership is drawn from the local industrial and financial community.

Mr. Silvester: Is the Minister aware that I am pleased that he has been able to list some areas where he takes local advice? Will he agree that it is important for the people in these areas to feel that they are participating closely in the assessment of aid? Is he further aware that local business men have a great deal of experience, particularly when it comes to matters relating to the skills and the work force available? Will he see what he can do further to extend the involvement of these gentlemen?

Mr. Cryer: As I have said, the independent regional industrial development boards already contain representatives from the business community. The Department is always willing to seek and receive advice. It is difficult to know what further action we can take to meet the hon. Member's point.

Mr. Anthony Grant: Does the Minister take any notice of the advice he receives from local business men? Can he cite any local business man who supports the unlawful policy of the Government of bullying small firms in the assisted areas merely because they will not comply with the Government's pay policy?

Mr. Cryer: The hon. Gentleman's assertion is totally unfounded. There has been no bullying of small firms by the Government. Small firms frequently find themselves more bullied by large firms, which have the support of Opposition Members. The Government have given a great deal of support and encouragement to small firms, and the Opposition should recognise that. In the regions these matters are considered by the various regional boards. There has been a caseload of more than 3,000, and the advice given has been accepted in those circumstances.

Mr. Fell: Will the hon. Gentleman have discussions with his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment about the position in Great Yarmouth and that area generally to ascertain whether something may be done to give more help, bearing in mind that lately the area has suffered greatly?

Mr. Cryer: That suggests to me that the hon. Gentleman is wanting more public expenditure for Yarmouth. The Opposition should clarify their hypocrisy. Externally they constantly call for cuts in public expenditure except when they affect their own constituencies. When that happens, they come bleating to the Government asking for more money.

Mr. Fell: On a point of order. Mr. Speaker. It is a bit rough for hon. Members to be called hypocrites when they ask simple questions.

Mr. Speaker: I think that the term was used in a general sense.

Oral Answers to Questions — CIVIL SERVICE

Catering Facilities (Subsidy)

Mr. Kenneth Lewis: asked the Minister for the Civil Service what is the element of subsidy provided on food served in Civil Service dining rooms and canteens in the various Ministries whose headquarters are in London.

The Minister of State, Civil Service Department (Mr. Charles R. Morris): By direct subsidy, just over 2p per day per employee, covering both meals and tea or coffee, based on about 50 per cent. of civil servants having access to staff restaurants. The figure for the London area is just over 2½p.

Mr. Lewis: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the loss on the catering of the House of Commons is due to large numbers of people other than Members of Parliament using the refreshment services? Is he also aware that the charges for meals in the dining rooms and canteens in Whitehall are cheaper than in this place?

Mr. Morris: I am not aware that the cost of meals in dining rooms and restaurants in the Civil Service Department or any other Department of State

is cheaper than in this place. On the general question of the financial implications of providing meals in staff restaurants, the hon. Gentleman might be interested to know that the Industrial Society surveyed the catering provisions of more than 100 firms in 1976. It reported that about 33 per cent. of the companies recovered only the cost of the food from their staff.

Mr. Buchan: Is my right hon. Friend aware that some of the best natural food that can be obtained is in Scotland? Will he try to persuade some of the more senior civil servants, who appear to be dragging their feet on dispersal, that by no means the least of the advantages that they would have on expediting the dispersal of civil servants to Glasgow would be to get some good food?

Mr. Morris: In that regard I agree with my hon. Friend. I hope that civil servants generally will have noted his comments.

Pay

Mr. Ovenden: asked the Minister for the Civil Service if he will make a further statement on the progress made towards reintroducing pay research into Civil Service pay determination.

Mr. Charles R. Morris: The Pay Research Unit has begun its survey work, which will be carried out under the auspices of the new Pay Research Unit Board. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister announced the appointments of the chairman and outside members of the Board on 27th February and 10th May respectively.

Mr. Ovenden: In view of recent reports which show that the pay of the Armed Forces, the doctors and the dentists has fallen behind general pay increases, will my right hon. Friend not be surprised if the Pay Research Unit reaches a similar conclusion on Civil Service pay? If it does, will he give an assurance that the Government will face their obligation to give public sector employees a fair deal and that they will not seek to avoid the conclusions of pay research?

Mr. Morris: There are a number of issues that surprise me from time to time. I cannot give any assurances on hypothetical situations that may arise in 1979.

Mr. Adley: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment constantly says that the Government's attitude towards the closed shop is one of neutrality? In the present negotiations and in other negotiations involving the Civil Service, why are the Government so frightened of the imposition of a closed shop on the industry?

Mr. Morris: The closed shop is in no way related to the Question to which I am addressing myself.

Mr. Wrigglesworth: Despite what my right hon. Friend says, will he think again about the proposal put forward to the trade unions about the closed shop before the next round of pay negotiations begins? Is he aware of the strong feeling on this issue which has been generated by the proposals which have been published? Will he think again about the proposals put to the unions and consider whether the closed shop principles which have been accepted for other trade unions outside the public sector should not be adopted for the Civil Service?

Mr. Morris: The Government are well aware of the intense feelings among Civil Service unions on union membership agreements. However, negotiations are proceeding and I do not wish to anticipate the outcome.

Mr. William Hamilton: asked the Minister for the Civil Service if he will make a statement on the progress made in dealing with the pay claims of civil servants.

Mr. Charles R. Morris: I expect this week to conclude a settlement with the unions representing non-industrial staff which provides for consolidation of the 1976 and 1977 pay supplements, an across-the-board increase of 9½ per cent. and a start to be made on the rectification of anomalies. The settlement is within the Government's guidelines and the operative date is 1st April.
Negotiations will start shortly on the claim for a substantial increase for industrial staff from 1st July.

Mr. Hamilton: Will my hon. Friend tell us whether, among the people to whom he is referring, there are any on a basic rate of £32 a week? As regards the question put by my hon. Friend the Member

for Bedwellty (Mr. Kinnock), is he aware that industrial civil servants are on that kind of basic wage? That is intolerable. Does he agree that the proposed phase 4 recommended by the Government of an increase of about 7 per cent. would be understandably unacceptable to those industrial civil servants? Will he assure the House that there will be a degree of flexibility in whatever phase 4 there might be to take care of these highly deserving people?

Mr. Morris: I cannot confirm whether industrial civil servants are on a basic rate of £32 a week, but I can confirm that some have take-home pay of that order.
My hon. Friend referred to phase 4. Industrial civil servants have not at this time received their settlement under phase 3.

Trade Unions

Mr. Canavan: asked the Minister for the Civil Service when he next expects to meet representatives of trade unions in the Civil Service.

Mr. Charles R. Morris: I am in regular contact with representatives of the Civil Service unions.

Mr. Canavan: Will my right hon. Friend encourage all the Civil Service unions to follow the example of the Society of Civil and Public Servants, which is firmly committed to job dispersal? Will he give an assurance that the Government's plans for job dispersal to Scotland and other places will not be blocked by a handful of senior civil servants who just want to hang on to their own power base in Whitehall?

Mr. Morris: I am grateful to my hon. Friend as he has given me the opportunity of making absolutely clear the Government's commitment to the dispersal of civil servants under the Hardman Committee's report. We intend to disperse 30,000 civil servants from London and the South-East to the geographical locations indicated.

Mr. Sims: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that members of the Civil Service unions feel strongly that there is no case for moving the laboratory of the Government Chemist from London to Cumbria and taking most of the scientists with it?


If he takes into account the feelings of the unions, will he give further consideration to the issue and consider that the circumstances which applied when the original decision was taken no longer apply and that the whole policy needs to be rethought?

Mr. Morris: I cannot accept that the whole policy needs to be rethought. It has been under examination since 1974. The benefits that the dispersal of civil servants brings to the regional locations which suffer from structural unemployment can be the determining factor.

Mr. Kinnock: Before my right hon. Friend next meets the leaders of the Civil Service unions, will he address himself to the publication of the Transport and General Workers Union entitled "A Fair Deal for Government Workers"? Will he take into account the 10-point proposition for the improvement of wages and conditions for industrial civil servants organised by that union and others, and remember that thousands of industrial civil servants receive pay that is less than supplementary benefit level?

Mr. Morris: I am conscious of the policy statement to which my hon. Friend draws my attention. The negotiations on an increase of pay for industrial civil servants are about to start. The operative date for the increase will be 1st July. I hope that an offer will be made to the unions representing industrial civil servants in early June.

Mr. Hayhoe: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Opposition will give support to the Government in resisting the outrageous claims made by leaders of some Civil Service unions for a closed shop? These claims are not supported by the membership of the unions. Does he agree that many other Civil Service unions take a wiser and more responsible attitude? Will he convey to his colleagues that we should like to see the same conditions as the Government are laying down for closed shops in the Civil Service extended throughout industry and commerce?

Mr. Morris: The hon. Gentleman is entitled to interpret the Government's position on union membership agreements. The factor that the Government hold to be crucial in the negotiations on UMAs is the accountability of the Government

and Ministers to this House. Those circumstances do not exist in the private sector.

Oral Answers to Questions — HOUSE OF COMMONS

Speeches (Time Limit)

Mr. David Price: asked the Lord President of the Council if he will consider proposing to the House that for an experimental period a time limit should be imposed on speeches in the Chamber.

The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Michael Foot): No, Sir.

Mr. Price: Does the Leader of the House recall the old wisdom—that there is no need for a speech to be eternal to be immortal? As voluntary efforts to shorten the length of speeches in this House have not been very successful, especially among Front Bench speakers and Back Bench Privy Councillors, has not the time come to try compulsion?

Mr. Foot: Hon. Members on both sides of the House may have their own different views on this subject. I think that few things could interfere more with the essential rights of Back-Bench Members than the introduction of a time limit.

Mr. Michael Stewart: Will my right hon. Friend consider a system whereby each Member at the beginning of the Session is given an allocation of time based on an estimate of the total time available and that any time he uses in the House, whether in speeches. Questions or points of order, should come out of his allocation? Would not that result in shorter speeches and fewer bogus points of order and other vexations?

Mr. Foot: I am not sure. What my right hon. Friend suggests might result in taciturnity at the beginning of the Session and garrulity at the end. I am not sure that that would be a good system.

Mr. Onslow: Are you aware, Mr. Speaker, that Back-Bench Members get more help from you in this matter than we seem to get from the Leader of the House? You give great encouragement to short Back-Bench speeches. Therefore, we look to the Leader of the House for shorter Front-Bench speeches.

Mr. Foot: I am in favour of shorter Front-Bench speeches. But I should point out that if the hon. Gentleman goes back over the history of the House of Commons for a number of years he will see that many of our most distinguished Back-Bench Members, whether Winston Churchill in the 1930s or Aneurin Bevan in the 1950s, would not have been able to make the contributions that they made if a rigid timetable had been enforced on Back-Bench Members.

Taxation

Mr. Ridley: asked the Lord President of the Council if he will seek to alter the situation so that this honourable House may increase taxation without a Ways and Means Resolution.

Mr. Foot: The financial procedures of the House are within the remit of the review being undertaken by the Procedure Committee. I suggest we await any proposals it may put forward.

Mr. Ridley: Does not the Lord President think it intolerable that a sovereign Parliament should be prevented from doing whatever it likes, including increasing taxation? In the long years of opposition that lie ahead for the Labour Party, would it not console it if it were able to indulge in its favourite sport of putting up taxation without its having to take effect?

Mr. Foot: The much more immediate question is how the official Opposition are to make their amendments passed the other day coherent to the country. I can understand that the hon. Gentleman has put down the Question on that basis. I suggest that the best way to proceed, in changing procedure on such a matter, is for the Procedure Committee to look at it. I certainly would not exclude such a proposition.

Mr. Gow: Does the Lord President think that it would be of particular advantage at this time if he expressed more clearly than he has done his own views on this matter? When we have a minority Government, is it not particularly important that it should be possible for the Opposition to change taxation? Will the right hon. Gentleman be more positive about this matter?

Mr. Foot: If any Leader of the House were to propose changing this practice

without a reference to the Procedure Committee, he would be justly criticised. That is what I have suggested.

Oral Answers to Questions — SCOTLAND BILL

Mr. Canavan: asked the Lord President of the Council what recent representations he has received about amendments which have been made to the Scotland Bill in the House of Commons and in the House of Lords; and what action he intends to take.

The Minister of State, Privy Council Office (Mr. John Smith): There have been a number of recent representations on the matters referred to by my hon. Friend. This House will, of course, have a further opportunity to consider amendments made in another place.

Mr. Canavan: Will the Government do everything possible to repair the damage done to the Scotland Bill by the political vandals in the House of Lords who clearly are voting fodder for the backwoodsmen who were congregating in Perth last week? In view of the previous declaration of Perth when the Tories promised a Scottish Assembly, is it not now clear that the right hon. Member for Newham, North-East (Mr. Prentice) was not the only renegade in Perth last week?

Mr. Smith: I assure my hon. Friend that the Government remain fully committed to the content of the Scotland Bill. We shall review the situation when another place has finished its consideration of it.
Regarding events at Perth, the topsy-turvy attitude of the Conservative Party on devolution is one of the most remarkable somersaults in British politics. Another matter that was most entertaining was the view put forward by the right hon. Member for Cambridgeshire (Mr. Pym), who seems to think that regional variations in the referendum result will be of some relevance.

Mr. Alexander Fletcher: Regarding events at Perth, the Minister's comments on them and his confidence in the Bill and the stage that it has reached, does the hon. Gentleman agree that if the hon. Member for West Stirlingshire (Mr. Canavan) believes that the House of Lords is making a mess of the Bill the matter can be tested when it comes back


to this House by there being a free vote on its final consideration?

Mr. Smith: It seems odd that a spokesman for the Conservative Party should ask for a free vote on a matter on which for a number of years it did not allow anyone who took a contrary view to speak at its conferences. Indeed, the Opposition are tightening up. The hon. Member for North Angus and Mearns (Mr. Buchanan-Smith) was on two occasions denied the right to speak at a Conservative Party conference because he disagreed with the official line. The hon. Gentleman knows that that is so.
I think that the hon. Gentleman when reflecting on events at Perth, might reflect on the fact that in 1968 the Conservative Party promised devolution and that it has now totally reneged on it. I am happy about that situation, because it means that only the Labour and Liberal Parties are committed to devolution. Therefore, we shall obtain the support of the people.

Oral Answers to Questions — HOUSE OF COMMONS

European Community Debates

Mr. Spearing: asked the Lord President of the Council what consultations he has held concerning his commitment relating to the practice of the House to debate important EEC proposals prior to decisions in Brussels.

Mr. Foot: As I said in November, the House will have the opportunity to decide upon the question of the Government's undertaking before the end of this Session. I shall consult interested parties as soon as possible.

Mr. Spearing: Does my right hon. Friend recall that on 28th November last he called my motion modest? Does he still resist the notion that this House or its Committees shall decide which matters shall be debated and not rest on the decision of a Minister of the Crown? If he holds that position and brings forward a motion to that effect, will it not be putting the House back into the position prior to 1688?

Mr. Foot: The House will be able to judge whether I am making any such outlandish propositions when I bring forward the motion. I agree that the matter that we then debated was important, even

though my hon. Friend's proposal did not carry us as far as he would wish in such a matter. I shall bring the proposition before the House at a fairly early date and the House itself will be able to judge.

Mr. Marten: Does the Leader of the House recall a suggestion that I put to him about three months ago, namely, that in order to avoid ridiculous late night debates on EEC matters we should perhaps, on one day a month, have a Consolidated Fund type of debate with votes at reasonable hours, say, 5 o'clock, 7 o'clock and 10 o'clock? As all three major parties, at the time of entry to the European Community, accepted the liability properly to debate EEC legislation should they not now all agree to that?

Mr. Foot: I am not sure whether that would be the most satisfactory way of solving the problem. I acknowledge that there are problems. But if we did not have debates at various intervals, as we have them now, it might be less easy to comply with the recommendations of the Scrutiny Committee and to fit in with the times when Ministers have to be entrusted with undertaking negotiations in Brussels. I do not believe that these matters could be consolidated into one day. We do try to overcome the problem, as I am sure the hon. Gentleman is aware.

Mr. John Ellis: Does my right hon. Friend agree that our present procedure is totally unsatisfactory? Major matters go through the House late at night, often with insufficient consideration, sometimes the Committees have not examined them and sometimes we have to consider a matter with the wrong documents. The Leader of the House has criticised the various suggestions that have been made today. Is he seized of a sense of urgency? What does he propose?

Mr. Foot: In the time that I have been Leader of the House we have had three or four debates on the way in which we conduct this business. In most of those debates the House has agreed—whatever criticisms hon. Members might still have—that we have sought to meet the previous criticisms. I do not say that the present situation is satisfactory because I believe that it arises from the nature of the position itself and the difficulties that are inherent in it. We try to overcome them. We have not achieved a perfect


solution, but I do not believe hat the proposal made by the hon. Member for Banbury (Mr. Marten) would be an improvement.

Mr. Dykes: Should not the Lord President be more positive about an anxiety which unites both pro and anti Common Marketeers? The Leader of the House has skilfully avoided giving an answer to another variation of the solution—that we should use more frequently the Standing Committee on Statutory Instruments &c., allow it to consider intelligent motions, take the less important items upstairs and allow more time on the Floor of the House for the more important EEC items.

Mr. Foot: I am not sure that that is the best solution. The House insists upon debating some of these matters. Therefore, what the hon. Member proposes is that the House of Commons Committee should be transformed into the same type of Committee as the House of Lords Committee on these matters. I doubt whether the House would tolerate such a situation since this House has always been more insistent on its rights than the House of Lords.

Oral Answers to Questions — THEFT BILL [Lords]

Order for Second Reading read.

Motion made, and Question put. That the Bill be referred to a Second Reading Committee.—[Mr. Frank R. White.]

And at least 20 Members having risen in their places and signified their objection thereto, Mr. SPEAKER declared that the Noes had it, pursuant to Standing Order No. 66 (Second reading committees).

PARLIAMENTARY CONTROL OF THE EXECUTIVE

3.32 p.m.

Mr. Edward du Cann: I beg to move,
That this House notes with concern that the degree of Parliamentary control over the Executive has diminished and is diminishing; believes the opportunities for regular supervision of the actions of the Executive by Parliament are inadequate in the modern context; is concerned with the implications for the Constitution and ultimately for the efficient operation of the democratic process in the United Kingdom; and is of the opinion that Parliament's powers of supervision and control now need to be strengthened and improved.
I express my gratitude to the Leader of the House for his courtesy in being here to discuss a subject which is of obvious interest to us all. I also express my gratitude to my hon. Friend the Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Mr. Maude). I expect that both my hon. Friend and the Leader of the House will agree with much of what I shall say.
To be a Member of this House is a marvellous and, indeed, in the old English sense of the word, an aweful experience. It is difficult to be here without loving this place and achieving a respect for the institution of Parliament which might border on veneration. Yet time and again I find myself asking questions about our methods of working, never more often than when I am boasting about them to the parties of young people whom we are privileged to take round the House of Commons.
I do not hold the opinion that Parliament is in decline. I do not hold the opinion that it is ineffective. But I do not hold the opinion that it is perfect. I do not believe that it is, in public esteem at any rate, as vigorous as once it was during my time here. There is nothing so good that it cannot be improved.
This is an ancient place. Not one of us who is here is not deeply sensible of its traditions and the way in which we have evolved our systems—many of which are ancient—over a period of time in the light of practical experience. The genius and success of this device for government by discussion—for that is what Parliament is—which has enabled our disparate society to live in peace and harmony over the centuries, sans revolution, sans serious discord, is a priceless possession.
In that belief and with humility I should like to offer some modest observations on our affairs and to pose some questions for general consideration. It is my intention to stimulate discussion.
This institution has kept our nation safe from excesses because it has provided authority and yet shown flexibility in its approach to government. In practice this provides an immediate dilemma: reconciliation of effective authority with its control is never easy. I believe it to be particularly difficult at this moment.
There are no perfect solutions to the organisation of this place. On the other hand, it is my purpose to argue that there are improvements which could and should be made. They very much need to be made. As a question by the hon. Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing) indicated a few moments ago, with support from pro- and anti-Marketeers, it is time to take stock of this institution. Whether we like it or not, this is a moment of great constitutional change.
There is no doubt that membership of the European Economic Community will force changes upon us. Next year, a twelve-month from now, we shall be electing the Members of the European Assembly and this House will become in essence a form of pure national, that is local, authority. It might be that from that there will derive new party alignments. There are signs of that already.
As the hon. Member for Newham, South correctly implied in his question, if the Westminster Parliament is to have any control over Ministers or economic policies in that great new Assembly, that great new institution, as it should, we must come to discuss European matters more often than the present timetable allows.
Another constitutional change is devolution. Whether one is for it or not, it is likely to be a fact and it has great implications.
There are also other changes which are not perhaps so obvious and which are not the result of consicious and specific decisions by the House. They are more gradual but none the less profound in their effects and they are relevant to my point and theme.
There has been an enormous growth in the volume of legislation. Some 50 years

ago we passed into law about 400 pages of legislation each year. This is an exceptional year, but the average is now over 3,000 pages. That works out at a Bill a day. The Leader of the House and the Chief Whip know that. We also deal with 10,000 pages of Statutory Instruments, plus all the paraphernalia of the EEC legislation. No right hon. or hon. Member would pretend for one moment that we give this legislation adequate scrutiny.
There is enormous growth in the Parliament. Important negotiations and discussions with the CBI and the TUC, for example, too often take place far away from this Chamber and its influence.
There is the growth in party discipline which is too obvious and too certain to need more description than the plain statement.
Then there is the growth of the vested interest of the placemen, the Ministers and their acolytes. We now have a new term of art to describe that situation—the ministerial vote, as it is called. [HON. MEMBERS: "The payroll vote."] Payroll vote—if right hon. and hon. Members prefer that term. The numbers grow continuously.
There is also the growth in the power of the Prime Minister and his office.
These are all matters of fact. They are matters with which we in this House must come to terms.
Above all, never in our history, except in war time, have Governments possessed such power as they have today. Never have they employed so many people, directly or indirectly. Never have they exerted such patronage, whether we speak of personal appointments or of aid to commerce and industry.

Mr. Dennis Skinner: I would agree with the right hon. Gentleman on some of the issues that he has raised, and I hope to catch Mr. Speaker's eye later in order to try to amplify them. However, on the question of bypassing Parliament and the associated matter to which the right hon. Gentleman has referred, may I ask what are his views upon the setting up of the lifeboat scheme, which used taxpayers' money, some of which went to Keyser Ullmann, in which he played a leading part, and which Parliament never had a chance to debate? Does the right hon. Gentleman believe that in 1973 that


matter should have come before the scrutiny of Parliament, the House of Commons, so that we could have decided on that issue?

Mr. du Cann: The hon. Gentleman, with the persistence for which he is notorious, never loses an opportunity to drag that particular matter out into the open.

Mr. Skinner: £1,300 million.

Mr. du Cann: It is not inappropriate that I should say concerning the particular matter to which the hon. Gentleman has referred that I have remarked before in the House that every penny of that money has been repaid and that interest was paid at the proper rate upon it while it was borrowed. However, regarding the hon. Gentleman's main point whether a matter of that sort—and we are talking about aid for the whole British banking system at a particular time of difficulty—should have been discussed and decided on by Parliament, in general I think that that would have been appropriate. If the hon. Gentleman will do me the courtesy of listening to me for a little while, instead of making a point which he believed would be personally embarrassing, perhaps he will find that there is more sympathy between us than he, with his prejudiced mind, might suspect.
The growth of Government authority goes further than I have so far had the chance to describe. An increased number of our basic industries are now Stateowned—that is to say, Government-controlled. But beyond that, the extent of control and regulation by Government of unowned commerce is vast. So is their budget, their taxation and their spending. Never in our history have Government operated in so many spheres.
My point is simply this: it is the balance that is wrong. As the power and influence of the Executive, of the Government, has increased, so our opportunities for scrutiny, control and examination seem to me to have diminished. The extension of the power of the Government and of the Executive is without doubt the largest domestic change of all.
The basic political theory of the constitution is that Parliament controls the Executive. That control is our final guarantee against unconstitutional Government.
It is true that Government cannot avoid criticism of their administrative policy Each year, for example, they must come to Parliament for money. It is open to the Opposition then to raise the broadest issues of policy or the smallest matter, a personal grievance, let us say, before supply is granted. But what is debated now in this House? What does it generally consist of? You know, Mr. Speaker, as we all know, that rarely today is it an open-minded discussion. It is rarely reason, an argument or, for all the pleasure we have from time to time of hearing the Leader of the House, oratory which influences or dominates the vote. So strong and so real are the modern party disciplines that the outcome of each vote is usually entirely predictable and the debates, in consequence, again as you, Mr. Speaker, know, are attended more by the speakers than they are by the listeners. So, what with the Whips and the party line, as Lord Hailsham says in that remarkable new book of his,
Debate is more and more a ritual dance, interspersed with cat calls.

Mr. Hugh Jenkins: On reflection, does the right hon. Gentleman not consider that since Lord Hailsham wrote that book, recent developments have made the outcome of the votes less and less predictable, to the embarrassment of the Front Bench, and that the power of the Whips, as I should have thought, was far from being stronger than it ever was and is perhaps not as strong as they would wish?

Mr. du Cann: The fact that some Labour Members went home early on one occasion does not invalidate my general view.
The moment that we abandon reason, that is to say, discussion, as an arbiter of events and an arbiter of policy, by substituting, for example, a machine-made majority, we are indeed on a slippery slope away from democracy.
Take Question Time, to which we have just listened. For all its uses and for all its virtues, the reality, as we all know, again, is that it is certainly not an effective method of interrogation of Ministers. It has become almost a ritual exchange of non-information. Is there not very often a better cross-examination of Ministers, not least the Prime Minister, by outsiders on the television or in the Lobby than there is by Members of Parliament?
Perhaps this House may think also that we should re-examine the way that we spend so much of our time. Do we spend too much time, for example, on the Floor of the House talking about the detail of legislation and not enough time discussing the conduct of administration? Considering how little time we give to discussing the reports of Select Committees of this House, one would think that that was certainly true. What is the point of having detailed examinations of Ministers, officials, outsiders and others upstairs if we never discuss these matters on the Floor of the House?
Undoubtedly Parliament must be ever conscious of its duty to sustain effective government, yet so strong and so real are the modern party disciplines, in spite of what the hon. Member for Putney (Mr. Jenkins) said a moment ago, that to a degree the control of the Executive is becoming more an honourable obligation upon the supporters of the Government of the day than upon their declared opponents. Of course, it is true that the defeat of the Government of the day on an issue of confidence in the House of Commons would entail their resignation and usually a General Election. But that is the extreme position.
Let me come back to the day-to-day. Just how well, how closely, how effectively, do we supervise, on a day-to-day basis, the activities of Ministers and their Departments, the State-owned corporations and the bodies in receipt of public funds? Judged by ordinary commercial practice, the best commercial practice, I would say hardly at all.
We need such devices as pre-legislative committees. It is not surprising that there is now in the House a great feeling in favour of greater use of Select Committees. As chairman of the 1922 Committee, I pay tribute to the Leader of the House for his sympathy and helpfulness when we have been discussing, together with the chairman of the Parliamentary Labour Party and his colleagues, matters which affect the present position of Members. It is becoming urgent that there should be vastly better facilities for research for individual Members. It cannot be right that some of us are obliged to pay hard-working—indeed, overworked—secretaries more money than the current parliamentary allowance gives.
Policy is rarely now determined on the Floor of the House. The practice is for decisions to be taken in Cabinet, in Cabinet Committees, and subsequently announced here. We rarely debate policy alternatives or compare outturn with forecasts as a deliberate matter of a running contemporary survey. Other than an occasional Select Committee survey, there is virtually no supervision of the nationalised industries.
We have established now, with the will of this House two new complex entrepreneurial organisations—the British National Oil Corporation and the National Enterprise Board—spending huge amounts of taxpayers' money. Yet we set up no machinery at all for questioning either their policy or their management.
Perhaps the Select Committee on Procedure will have useful recommendations to make in due time. I certainly hope so. In the meantime, I have a suggestion of my own. There is one aspect of our parliamentary machine which is in urgent need of modernisation. It was during the period of struggle with the Crown that Parliament evolved what was then an efficient and complex procedure for the control of finance by the House of Commons. That procedure is simply no longer effective. Yet the obvious and easiest way of controlling the Executive is by controlling the purse strings. That is exactly what Parliament does not do and no longer even attempts to do. For example, we vote the spending of millions of pounds—on occasion tens and even hundreds of millions of pounds—

Mr. Hugh Fraser: Billions.

Mr. du Cann: Billions, if my right hon. Friend prefers. We vote the expenditure of these huge amounts of money on the nod—that is to say, without proper discussion of any kind.
The occasions when we might as a House debate money matters are attended by specialists only or used for a series of Adjournment debates or end—to use the expression again—as catcalling sessions on strictly party lines. We never budget in the orthodox financial sense, measuring revenue against expenditure and vice versa. In spite of the recommendations of Lord Plowden's committee of some years ago, we have never discussed


or decided as a House the proportions of the gross national product to be allocated respectively to the public and the private sectors. I am not arguing what the levels should be in that case. The opinions of party men across the Floor of the House will inevitably differ. I just argue and complain, as a House of Commons man, that Parliament no more controls Government expenditure than Canute controlled the tide.
I do not know how many right hon. and hon. Members are familiar with an excellent little book published by a distinguished Principal Clerk of this House, Dr. Taylor. There are two quotations that I would give from that excellent and clear work. First, Dr. Taylor himself writes:
Control of expenditure in a direct sense hardly belongs to the House of Commons any more.
On the next page he quotes Professor Ramsay Muir, who gave a paper to the Select Committee on Public Business some little time ago. He said:
The power of the purse is supposed to be the main source of authority of the House of Commons. It has become wholly unreal. There is no parliamentary country in which Parliament has less power over finance than in Britain.
Put into plain English, those quotations mean simply that we are not carrying out the function with which our fellow citizens have entrusted us, and democracy is the poorer as a result.
The need for action now is urgent. Public concern in my time in this House has never been greater than it is today about the way in which taxpayers' money is spent—I believe, with good reason.
If we are effective, we shall enjoy more public confidence and respect than this Parliament currently enjoys. It is not that Members of Parliament do not work hard. That is not the reason for complaint. The point is that we do not necessarily work at the right things.
I have a modest proposal in this respect. The Public Accounts Committee has been examining, in collaboration with the Treasury, ways in which cash limits, which now cover 65 per cent. of Supply expenditure, might be assimilated with the Estimates. If my colleagues who are members of that Committee are kind enough to support the report which has now been drafted as they have been good enough to do in the past, I believe that

it will be possible to assimilate the Estimates with cash limits and to put recommendations before this Chamber to that effect. Thereby, we might have the chance to restore some control—a control which we have almost completely lost.

Mr. Robin Maxwell-Hyslop: Would my right hon. Friend care to comment on the disreputable device known as the Civil Contingencies Fund, which enables even the theoretic control which the House possesses to be completely bypassed?

Mr. du Cann: I know that my hon. Friend has a particular view on that matter, and I largely sympathise with what he says.
To come back to the general: as the constitutionalists say, Parliament is supreme. In theory there is nothing that Parliament cannot do. As Dicey wrote:
It can make or unmake laws.
It can and does confiscate property. It can take away liberty and even life itself, and it has. It can take this nation to war or make peace.
Over the years, Parliament has come to mean virtually the House of Commons alone, so ineffective, let us not forget, now is the House of Lords. The House of Commons has come to mean the majority party, and that in turn has come to mean the Cabinet, supported by its disciplined Members of Parliament.
This nation is almost unique in that we have no written constitution. The The chief sanction upon the good behaviour—that is to say, the constitutional obedience—of Government is convention, not the law. It is the general good sense of the Members of Parliament of the governing party. Because I believe in the modern context that it is essential now to set some obvious declared limit to the hitherto unlimited powers of the legislature and because I do not think that we can for ever count upon the loyalty of future majority parties to our constitutional traditions and practice, I have argued in the past for a Bill of Rights to restrict the opportunity for Parliament to affect the rights of individuals. Put at its best, it is an invariable temptation for expediency to father carelessness, and there are increasing examples of that. Put at its very worst, and suppose that extremists were to capture control of either of the


main parties, indeed our constitutional rights would be at risk.
If we were to have a Bill of Rights it would be a first step towards a written constitution, written and defined by law. I believe that now to be essential because the absence of legal limitations on Parliament is unacceptable, particularly now that there is no effective Second Chamber.
Finally, it is important to be clear-minded about the duty of Back Benchers on both sides. It should never be our primary commitment to assist Government to get their legislation. Our first duty is to subject legislation, administration and policy to an effective running scrutiny. It is not our proper role to be, as we are so often today, mere critics after events. Rather we should be involved from the outset in policy and administration. The more we are, the more we shall have the opportunity to associate the public with what is done, and the more we shall have the opportunity perhaps of restoring interest in this place and its doings.
I avow my faith in democracy and in its handmaiden, the British Parliament. Both are, as they should be in a free society, ever on trial. Is there not an especial need today that in the context of the advance of the forces of darkness in Africa, Asia and South America, and now in the context of our membership of the EEC, as so many who argued in favour of that demanded, we should give a special example of how democracy is practised and needs to be practised?
Should we not set and maintain our own example of its efficient working? Like love, democracy will survive all attacks except neglect, indifference and carelessness. There is a need now for a further improvement in our methods and systems. Mindful, then, of our heritage in this place and of our habit of evolution, and remembering that there is no single panacea, let us agree today, if right hon. and hon. Members will go with me, that progress be made.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. Before I call the next hon. Member to speak, I remind the House that the debate will finish at 7 o'clock. A very large number of hon. Members have indicated their wish to

speak, and I hope that that will be borne in mind by those who are fortunate enough to catch my eye.

4.3 p.m.

Mr. Ian Mikardo: I shall take at once the broad and kindly hint that you have just dropped, Mr. Speaker, and confine myself to only a few minutes. I am aware, as you have pointed out, Mr. Speaker, that many right hon. and hon. Members wish to speak
I begin by extending to the right hon. Member for Taunton (Mr. du Cann) my deeply held, sincere and warm thanks for putting this motion on the Order Paper. I do so for three reasons. First, he has used the Private Members' time available to him to raise a subject of major importance that we ought to have discussed long ere now. He has given us an opportunity to discuss it. Secondly, I agree with every word in his motion—although not in his speech, although I agreed with nearly all of that, too. Thirdly, his motion is an example of the proper and best use of Private Members' motion time which I am sorry to say is not followed very often. All too often hon. Members who succeed in getting this time use it to push some narrow local point or, even worse, to push a point in the day-to-day party battle across the Floor of the House. They therefore use Private Members' time merely as an adjunct to Government time, if it is from the Government side of the House, or to Opposition time, if it is from the other side. That is throwing away Private Members' time.
I believe that we should do two things through Private Members' motions. First, we should use them to discuss long-ranging policies—for example, consideration of questions of energy supply, of world food supply between now and the end of the century, of environmental considerations, of the battle between material standards on the one hand and environmental decency on the other, of what to do about the manifestly constantly decreasing demand for labour and therefore the constantly increasing amount of leisure time available to people, and other such broad subjects which do not form part of our day-to-day rumpuses. Further, we should discuss the sort of thing that the right hon. Member for Taunton has put before us today—the opportunity to take a cold, hard look at ourselves from time to time.
I said that I support every word of the right hon. Gentleman's motion. So much do I do so that I sent a copy of it to the Table Office with my signature appended in order to show by my name on the Order Paper the extent of my support. Great was my surprise when I received a chit from the Table Office telling me that I was not allowed to do so. An hon. Member is not allowed to indicate his support for the Private Member's motion of another hon. Member which is put down in the manner of the motion before us. Can you think of anything more daft, Mr. Speaker?
If the right hon. Gentleman had tabled his motion for an early day—a motion for a date not fixed—200 of us could have added our names to it. In other words, a Back Bencher has the right to indicate on the Order Paper his support for another hon. Member's motion as long as it is never likely to be discussed. But where a motion is put forward which is to be discussed, one is not allowed to indicate support for it. Moreover, if the right hon. Gentleman had put down his motion for a fixed date and as an amendment to a Government or Opposition motion on a Supply Day, I would have had the right to indicate my support for it even though it was so dated.
In other words, a private Member's right to indicate support exists only in respect of another private Member's motion which he has thown away in order to use it on Government or Opposition business, or in respect of one that is never likely to be discussed. That sort of behaviour is one of many examples of cases that defy all common sense and logic. If we set up a Select Committee consisting of the first dozen "bods" we found on the top of a Clapham omnibus and asked it to investigate our procedures, it would say "It is daft that you can support things that are not going to be discussed but cannot support things that are". That is not the only example.
The right hon. Gentleman has drawn attention to the growing imbalance between the power of the Front Benches and the power of the Back Benches. I refer principally to the power of the Government Front Bench, although in recent times we have put a bit more resources—quite properly, and I do not object—at the disposal of the Opposition

Front Bench, too. The only people who have had no significant further resources put at their disposal are the Back Benchers. As the right hon. Member for Taunton said, one of the reasons for this growing imbalance of power is the increasing volume of legislation which makes it difficult for Back Benchers to cope.
Let me add a second. There is a qualitative as well as quantitative factor. There is not only the increasing volume of legislation but the fact that the legislation constantly becomes more and more complex. It therefore demands a good deal more expertise than in the past properly to examine or criticise it. The evidence of that is in the expert advice that is available to Ministers. The number of civil servants and specialisations in the public service has increased out of all proportion to the position 10 years ago. No such growth has occurred in the expert advice, and therefore the cultivation of expertise, to and on behalf of Back Bench Members.
I believe, and many other right hon. and hon. Members believe, that, although there is no complete solution to this problem, as the right hon. Gentleman rightly said, one possible corrective would be a series of Select Committees with much wider powers and much more adequate staffing than our present Select Committees but set up in such a way that there was a Select Committee corresponding with each of the major Departments of State, rather as happens in the United States of America.
Although some of us, I think justifiably, have criticisms of some aspects of the congressional system and the presidential system in the United States, nobody in the world can deny that it is a much more open society than ours, that it has a much more open Parliament than we have, and that it has a much better equipped Parliament than we have. The imbalance between the Executive and the legislature is much narrower in the United States than it is here and, not least important, that system is run in such a way that the ordinary citizen gets far more information about what is going on than does the ordinary citizen in this country.

Mr. Geoffrey Finsberg: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that a


very real danger in the American system is that the staffers are frequently on the committees for longer than the actual members and in many cases they are doing the questioning rather than the committee members themselves?

Mr. Mikardo: That is right. That was one of the things I had in mind when I said that there were some aspects about the system in America that we might justifiably criticise. I cannot imagine most hon. Members, at any rate not those with sufficient experience as to be likely to be appointed Chairman of Select Committees of the type I am talking about, allowing themselves to be run by members of the staff. There is no shortage of pretty independent and pretty sturdy customers on both sides of the House of Commons.
If we had a Select Committee corresponding to each of the major Departments of State, we should build up a group of Members with expertise in that field acquired over a period, especially if those Members could call on specialist advisers to a greater extent than is possible at present.
The great problem that the Back Bencher has—I say this as one who has been a Back Bencher for a very long time and who is likely to be a Back Bencher for the last few years he spends in the House—is that all too often the Departments blind Back-Bench Members with science or with jargon. I can quote an experience of mine on which I think the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley) will bear me out. I spent four years as Chairman of the Select Committee on Nationalised Industries. We had a pretty stable team during that period; there were very few changes. After three or four years we were just not looking at the superficialities but were digging down to the roots. We had a group of people there—we had a lot of very good advice, different types of expertise in different spheres according to the different inquiries that we undertake—who could not be kidded by the Departments.
I shall give an obvious example. When we started to look at a matter over which the Treasury has always fooled the House of Commons—the techniques of the financial control of the nationalised industries

—the Treasury started chucking at us abstruse talk about investment criteria by discounted cash flow techniques and pricing policies based on long-run marginal costing and it thought that we would go goggle eyed. However, after two or three years we knew more about those matters than anybody in the Treasury and we could stand up to the Treasury.
It would be useful to have a group of Members who had made themselves expert in agriculture and fisheries, in education and science, in the affairs of the Home Office, and so on. I know that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House does not agree about this. For many years he and I have agreed to differ on this matter. I hope that no one will say that the reason that my right hon. Friend is against this is that he is a Minister and, therefore, an interested party, because the fact is that he took the same view for many years before he became a Minister, when he never expected to become a Minister. It is out of conviction that my right hon. Friend holds this view. I think that he is wrong.
My right hon. Friend thinks that we could exercise all the control that we want in the Chamber. I believe that he is right and that we could, if the House were to sit for 100 weeks a year and for 20 days a week and for 50 hours a day. But the volume of work is now too great. My right hon. Friend is thinking back to the parliamentary periods on which he is a very great authority. We are not now dealing with the mild controversies of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. We now have this very great volume of stuff about which the right hon. Member for Taunton told us.
We therefore need a very great degree of specialisation. We need to spread the expertise. That is what every other major organisation does. The companies and public corporations which are most effective are those which have learned how to spread expertise over the widest possible area. They are those which have learned how to use economies of scale by getting groups of people together who raise their expertise one of another. That is what we must do.
I agree very much with the right hon. Member for Taunton that it is no good having such Committees as I have recommended if their reports are to be discussed as little and as seldom as reports of


present Select Committees are discussed. Another matter I object to is—who decides which reports are discussed now? It is the Government Front Bench. Why should it have the right to make such a decision? The Government pick the reports that cause them the least embarrassment and not those that are the most important from the point of view of the protection of the citizen.
Just as at the beginning of each Session there is a determination that X days will be Supply Days for the Opposition and Y days will be Private Members' days, there should be an allocation of Z days for the discussion of the reports of the departmental Select Committees, and the choice of which reports are to be discussed on those days should be made by a committee of chairmen of those Select Committees because they know best which studies have produced the best and most valuable information.

Mr. Cranley Onslow: Would not the hon. Gentleman go a little further and recognise that at present, when we get time to discuss one of these reports, very frequently the only people who turn up to take part in the debate are those Members who have been fortunate enough to be on the Select Committee and that the rest of the House, there being no vote at the end of the day, absents itself? Does not the hon. Gentleman agree that only by tying the debate into the vote of money for the purposes of the Department concerned shall we ever get any bite into the issue at all?

Mr. Mikardo: I agree. It is precisely the point that I am making. It is only because there is not now a direct confrontational relationship between a Select Committee and a Secretary of State and those in his Department that there is such indifference and because, in any case, the reports which the Government choose for debate are those which are the least interesting and not those which are of most importance.

Mr. David Price: Does the hon. Gentleman agree with the further proposition that as long as a substantial number of Back Benchers are aspiring to office either in the current Government or in the next Government, the number of hon. Members who are prepared to press the views they express in Select Committee the whole way against

their Front Bench is, unfortunately, not as great as the merits of many a Select Committee report warrant?

Mr. Mikardo: I do not share that view. There are such people. There are those who, from the moment when they enter this place, think of themselves as in transition from the Back Bench to the Front Bench, but I think that they are small in number. In any case, with great respect to the hon. Gentleman, the point is irrelevant to our subject because that could be true whatever system we had.
I have something else to say about Select Committees. I know that some of my hon. Friends—I believe that my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) is one—are a bit worried about Select Committees because they think that Select Committees are a move in the direction of consensus politics.

Mr. Skinner: That is right.

Mr. Mikardo: My hon. Friend says that that is right, but I must tell him that it depends on the quality and persistence of the Members involved. I have been a Member of a Select Committee—

Mr. Skinner: So have I.

Mr. Mikardo: My hon. Friend was on for one day, and I chaired one for four years, so, with respect to him, I shall not let him tell me anything about Select Committees. I know more about them than he does.
I have already mentioned the time when I chaired the Select Committee on Nationalised Industries. The hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury was a member of it, a regular attender and one who participated fully in its work. I do not believe that one could imagine that a Committee which contained that hon. Gentleman and myself, not to mention a few other almost equally forthright, plain-speaking and committed characters, would be likely to go for long without moments of controversy. Indeed, we did not go long without moments of controversy. There were things that we had to fight out, and it was right that that should be so.
So I say to my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover that those who have a disposition towards consensus will exercise that disposition in any medium and


do not need a Select Committee to do so.

Mr. Skinner: rose—

Mr. Mikardo: No, I shall not give way. I promised not to take long. I wish to touch on one last subject, which is why I do not want to give way to my hon. Friend—not out of any discourtesy.

Mr. Skinner: I shall not forget.

Mr. Mikardo: I believe than an important part of Back-Benchers' rights is the right which we are using today, namely, the allocation of Private Members' time. But in order to make it a useful part of our rights we must use that time sensibly. I have already referred to the fact that some Members waste their Private Members' motions by putting down subjects which could equally well be discussed in other ways and through other media. There is nothing that we can do procedurally about that, but I am concerned about some of our procedures on Private Members' Bills, with which, in one way or another, I have been a bit involved in recent weeks, and not merely in recent weeks, because I took a strong interest in procedure on Private Members' Bills as long as 20 years ago.
In my view, we must examine our procedures in this respect. Over the past four or five Sessions, we have reached a point at which it is nearly universally true, though not quite, that the Bills which are seriously discussed never get passed and the only Bills which ever get passed are those on which there has been no serious discussion.
Would it make sense to our Select Committee of 12 Members off the top of the Clapham omnibus that we can get a Bill through the House only if we do not examine it? We got one through the other day because there was great public pressure for it, but it is a bad Bill, loosely drawn, which will not fulfil its functions and which the House of Lords is now having to amend in very large measure. The only way we could get it through was by undertaking not to look at it. Members all cheerfully voted for it, but 90 per cent. of them had not read the Bill and had no idea how bad it was.

Mr. Skinner: Consensus again.

Mr. Mikardo: Thus, we discuss Bills which do not get passed or we pass them without discussion.
I regard as absolutely daft that one Member should be able to do what I did once or twice recently, that is, stop the progress of a Bill after 4 o'clock. It is right that there should be machinery for stopping a Bill, but not at the hands of one Member. Our present procedure is nonsensical. There ought to be a requirement for a reasonable number of Members standing in their places to do it. The present system puts far too much destructive power in the hands of one Member.
I have been saying this for 20 years, and now that a very popular Bill has been affected by our present procedure, someone may start to listen and perhaps get the Select Committee on Procedure to look at it.
Why do we have to take all Private Members' Bills only on Fridays, or almost exclusively on Fridays? What is the logical reason for that? No one has ever been able to tell me. Because we take them on Fridays, Private Members' Bills are very much at the mercy of the requirement that we have to have 100 Members for a closure. In my view, the prescription that we cannot have a closure without 100 Members voting is one of the daftest pieces of our procedure.
We can carry a major piece of legislation by a vote of 50 to 40. We can carry a wrecking amendment to a major piece of legislation by a vote of 50 to 40. We can carry a motion to reduce the salary of a Secretary of State—which is a vote of censure on him—and get him sacked by a vote of 50 to 40. The only thing which we cannot get passed by a vote of 50 to 40 is a motion that we stop talking and shut up. Does that make sense? What sort of sense is there in it?
I go along with the right hon. Member for Taunton in saying that we ought to ask our Procedure Committee to look at some of the issues which he raised and which I have ventured to raise, especially with the thought in mind that something must be done to narrow the ever-widening gap between the power and influence of the Government and the power and influence of the Back Bencher.

Mr. Speaker: May I make one more appeal? I know that the hon. Member


for Bethnal Green and Bow (Mr. Mikardo) did his best to help me, but he took 24 minutes to do it. If other hon. Members do the same, some who wish to speak will be very unlucky.

4.27 p.m.

Mr. A. J. Beith: I hope to abide by your injunction, Mr. Speaker.
I wish to refer briefly to some aspects of this matter which I believe should be considered. Any observer not familiar with the important question which the right hon. Member for Taunton (Mr. du Cann) has put before us would, I think, be surprised that it should be asked at all. Any observer who had simply read a textbook version of the supposed relationship between Parliament and the Executive and who did not read our parliamentary history would wonder why Parliament had in some way to seek to increase its power over the Executive, for the Executive owes all its authority to Parliament and can do nothing without securing and using that authority.
Parliament is sovereign, and all authority depends on parliamentary consent. The Executive itself is drawn from Parliament and depends on obtaining a majority there. How, therefore, can it be that Parliament has to ask itself for ways of increasing its hold over the Executive and lament some apparent decline in its hold over the Executive?
The reason, of course, lies in the way our party system has developed and the way it has become accepted that the first duty of the group of Members on the Government side is to sustain the Executive and the first duty of those on the Opposition Benches is in some way to get rid of the Executive or speed its demise.
We should remember, however, that that state of affairs has been changed, perhaps more than the right hon. Member for Taunton acknowledged, over the past few years. One of the agencies of that change has been the precise parliamentary arithmetic in this Parliament. But over an earlier period one of the agencies in strengthening the Government's hands has undoubtedly been our electoral system itself, because it has allowed Executives which are minorities to enjoy the power of majorities. Executives which have been returned with only minority

support of the electorate—38 per cent. of those voting in the case of the present Government were—are in this House put in a majority position, able to get legislation through and withstand parliamentary attack.
The proposition that this gives the people of this country strong government seems to me to be very much challenged by the mistakes which such Executives tend to make under the illusion that anything which they think of and which their Members will support is a mark of strength. They proceed to carry into legislation things which the next Government reverse. The sorry history of legislation on the steel industry and industrial relations reveals many examples of the tendency to move from the supposed strong measures of one Government to the antithesis of those measures then brought forward by another.
But the situation in this Parliament, even under the present electoral system, has been an agency for change. The Government have been deprived of a majority, and as a result have been forced to modify proposals or have those proposals modified for them on the Floor of the House. Minority Government has undoubtedly brought about a situation in which the Executive must look to Parliament—and very carefully—to see whether it can carry through its proposals.
One must, therefore, qualify any criticisms one makes of the extent to which Parliament can control the Executive by the clear admission that in the present situation the Executive is more than usually subject to parliamentary limitations. But even in cases where a Government have a clear majority within the House of Commons, why should Members of Parliament let the Government have all their own way? After all, that majority is itself made up of Members of Parliament who surely do not wish the Executive to win in all situations.
I venture to suggest that some of the most powerful opponents of reform to strengthen the Executive are those whose first call, when a Government are defeated, is "Resign, resign". We have heard that cry often on the lips of hon. Members in recent weeks, but let us think for a moment of its implications. The people whose first instinct, when a Government are defeated, is to say "Resign" are the exponents of the "Take it or


leave it" school of government. The Government, they argue, must be in a position to put before Parliament proposals which will go through, perhaps challenged but never defeated or substantially modified. The "Take it or leave it" view is that if a Government cannot get their way, they ought not to be a Government at all.
I can think of no more powerful enemy of reforms intended to strengthen the hands of Parliament against the Executive than the supposition that the Government should always get their unmodified way, except in those circumstances where behind the scenes they are prepared to concede to some group of people that some change may be necessary.
I have heard the shout "Resign" not merely in recent situations but ever since I came here. It is the first cry when a Government are defeated on any vote at all. Those who shout "Resign" reject implicitly the idea that a Government should ever have their policies changed. Many of those for whom that is the first reaction would rather see a Government have their errors writ large than have their policies changed. It is part of the view that the Government should make as many mistakes as possible, and then make way for a Government of whom such people hope themselves to be members. It is a view which is permanently destructive of any change in the relationship between the Executive and Parliament.
Moreover, those very calls and cries play upon the willingness of Members of the majority party to bring about the change or defeat of their own Government on any issue which is not an issue of confidence. What is supposed to be the effect or result of calling upon a Government to resign when they have been defeated on some matter? What can be the consequence but to make the Government's own supporters think "Perhaps I should not have voted in that way", or "Perhaps I should not in any way challenge my Government, because the end result will be that the Government will have to resign, and the broader principles which I support will be sacrificed because of my disagreement with them on this issue."
The "Resign, resign" brigade have their most potent allies on the Government

side among the "Don't rock the boat" persuasion, upon whom this argument bears particularly strongly. They turn angrily upon their colleagues, who on a Select Committee or in some other way have argued against the current policy of Ministers, and say "You are challenging our Ministers, the people we have put there, and whom it is our duty to sustain".
There were very angry reactions on the Labour Benches to the stand taken by members of the Select Committee on Nationalised Industries in discussion of the steel industry. These were Members whose loyalty to their Government was in no way in dispute but who took strong views both about the information to which that Committee should have access and about which conclusions should be drawn from it. Those who turn upon them and argue that it is in some way disloyal for them to press their case are in the same camp—some of them acknowledgedly so, and the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) would be no exception—as those who do not want to change the relationship between Parliament and the Executive, and who wish Governments to present to Parliament things which they will get through.

Mr. Skinner: As to the report of the Select Committee on the steel industry, and the report of the Select Committee dealing with race relations, the same argument applies. It is not so much that there are certain people who come up with a certain report. That has nothing to do with it. It is the fact that I do not agree with the contents of their report. I go further and argue that in a situation where they are in the belly of consensus, they are bound to come out with a report which is all things to all people. That is my gripe about Select Committees. There are ways of changing this, of course, and I shall deal with them later if I catch Mr. Speaker's eye.
On the other question that the hon. Gentleman has just raised, perhaps the answer to the so-called "Don't rock the boat" brigade and those who shout "Resign" is a four-year term of office.

Mr. Beith: The hon. Gentleman has done a rare thing in putting forward a proposal with which I wholly agree and which is enshrined in the policies of my party. But he distinguishes himself, I


am glad to note, from those who think it disloyal in principle to use a Select Committee to voice criticisms of their Government by simply saying, as he has every right to do, that he disagreed with the conclusions of the Committee. In some respects I am entirely with him. I disagree with some of the conclusions of the two Committees to which he has referred.
The "Don't rock the boat" argument is a clear, potential inhibition on Select Committees using their existing powers. Unless hon. Members in all parties recognise that government is an engine that has to be steered as well as simply pushed—and an engine to the direction of which attention must be devoted, as well as to its movement—parliamentary control can never be effective.
I have concentrated on the political background to parliamentary scrutiny because I believe it is the most important question to face. The machinery needs changes, and the Procedure Committee, of which I am a Member, is at present charged with the task of putting forward proposals about that machinery. We must await its conclusions.
I declare my own support for some of the things that have been mentioned today, such as the development of the Select Committee system, linked to the financial appropriations of Departments, changes in the way in which we Handle finance and taxation in this House, and the ability of parties other than the Government to put down amendments to increase taxation. There is also the problem of dealing with European business and the extent to which time in the House—and, indeed, appointments to the Committees of the House—are effectively in the hands of the Front Benches on each side. All these are areas in which change is necessary.
I want to confine myself today to saying that whatever valuable things we do in those directions, in altering or improving the machinery for parliamentary scrutiny of the Executive, will count for little if the preponderance of Members prefer the "take it or leave it" approach, the "Let them make as big a mess of it as they can because we shall be in sooner" approach. If that approach is preferred by Members, no changes in the machinery will ever be of any lasting value, and whenever the Procedure Committee

brings forward its proposals it is in the light of our attitudes to that fundamental question that we must assess them.

4.37 p.m.

Mr. John Garrett: I welcome the opportunity to debate this important subject, and I express my agreement with the basic proposition of the motion that parliamentary control over the Executive must be more strongly asserted.
I believe that parliamentary control will not be improved until the focus and emphasis of this House are switched from the debating Chamber to the Committee. A legislature which centred on debate and oral questions may have been sufficient to control a nineteenth century Government machine, but it is quite incapable of calling to account Ministers and officials who manage today's huge Executive, with its Department of State, its public corporations and its quasi-autonomous Government organisations.
The only way to establish accountability, to analyse objectives and results, discern priorities, and get to the root of policy decisions is to construct an effective system of investigatory committees of Parliament. I dispute the fears of some of my right hon. and hon. Friends that such a development will necessarily lead to consensus politics and will blunt the edge of party politics. I believe that a powerful Committee system can enable the party conflict to be conducted in a more informed and intelligent way than it is now.
The construction of new machinery in the form of Committees, each shadowing Departments, is an important first step, but it is only a first step. A new Committee structure is a means and not an end. The end is increased public accountability, and to achieve that we need not only a new Committee structure but a much enlarged parliamentary staff, a massive improvement in the quality and quantity of information provided to Parliament by the Executive, and membership of this House to be recognised as a fulltime job.
Dealing first with the new structure of Committees, it seems to me that a good place to start is the Public Accounts Committee, the Chairman of which introduced the debate. In the four years


that I have been in this House, I have tried to show that our system of State audit—the Public Accounts Committee, the Comptroller and Auditor General and the Exchequer and Audit Department, which should be the strongest arm of the Executive in calling officials to account—is quite remarkably underdeveloped as an arrangement for enforcing public accountability. I shall not repeat the arguments here, except to remind the House that ours uniquely is a system of constitutional audit which is exceptionally narrow in scope and coverage—covering only half of public expenditure—of insufficient expertise and alarmingly dominated by the Executive or, more specifically, the Treasury. I first discovered this 10 years ago when I read the penetrating study of accountability and audit of Governments by Dr. E. L. Normanton. I know that the Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee has acknowledged the work done by Dr. Normanton in this regard. I am glad to see that Dr. Normanton's ideas are now becoming increasingly accepted.
The Eleventh Report of the Expenditure Committee on the Civil Service called for a thorough reform of the Public Accounts Committee—Exchequer and Audit system—and the Green Paper published last month by the national executive committee of the Labour Party on the reform of the House of Commons singled out the PAC for comment. It recommended specifically that

"(i) The expenditure to be audited should be redefined to cover all public expenditure, including the spending of state funds by private organisations.
(ii) The House of Commons, advised by the Public Accounts Committee should appoint the Comptroller and Auditor General.
(iii) The House of Commons, advised by the Public Accounts Committee should decide on the numbers, grading and qualifications of the audit staff.
(iv) The House of Commons, advised by the Public Accounts Committee should decide on the information required in the accounts which are submitted.
(v) The audit process should be extended to give the Public Accounts Committee the power to examine the management, the efficiency and the effectiveness of all spenders of State funds."

This Green Paper by the national executive committee of the Labour Party makes other recommendations with

regard to investigatory committees and a new form of legislative committee which would enable MPs considering legislation to cross-examine witnesses. I hope that this report will be adopted by the party conference this autumn. I only hope that there is as much interest inside the Conservative Party in reform of the House of Commons and its procedures.
In the Government's reply to the Expenditure Committee's report, the Government made a point of declaring the "statutory independence" of the Comptroller and Auditor General. I find that very alarming and I should like the Leader of the House to make particular reference to it. The Government reply said:
The Government consider it of cardinal importance that the Comptroller and Auditor General should not be subject to directions from any quarter in the exercise of the duties laid upon him to undertake an effective audit and scrutiny of the expenditure of the Executive.
It is worth noticing that at the time when the Government were saying that the Comptroller was independent they were replying on his behalf. So much for his independence. I regard this as an unconstitutional convention that the Comptroller and his staff are the servants of Parliament. The Exchequer and Audit Departments Act 1866, in setting up the office, said that the Comptroller should examine the accounts
on behalf of the House of Commons.
The 1921 Act repeated that phrase, and in the Second Reading debate on 5th August 1921 the Chancellor referred to the Comptroller as an Officer of the House "signalised by statute". Leading academic texts on the subject refer to the Comptroller as the
acting hand of the Public Accounts Committee.
and "a parliamentary Officer". I can only suspect that the Government are trying surreptitiously to reject 100 years of parliamentary convention and to weaken the powers of this House in respect of audit. I hope that the Lord President will satisfy the House on this point.
Although I am in favour of vastly strengthening the Public Accounts Committee immediately, it is to my mind an anachronism and should be combined with the Expenditure Committee—I know


that the Chairman of the PAC agrees with this point of view—into about a dozen separate committees, each shadowing a Department or group of Departments and each supported by about 20 or 30 specialist staff. There would be no overall increase in staff as a result of this change, because the PAC can at present call on the 620 staff of the Exchequer and Audit Department.

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: Before the hon. Gentleman leaves the question of the Comptroller and Auditor General, may I ask him whether he thinks that it is a healthy practice for someone to go from being second permanent secretary at the Treasury and, therefore, accounting officer, to the office of invigilating the very function which he was himself performing?

Mr. Garrett: I think it is a very bad practice that the Comptroller and Auditor General—the State auditor—is, so far as I can see, always appointed by the Civil Service from the higher ranks of the Civil Service. That seems to be quite wrong.
In addition to investigatory committees having substantial staffs of their own, Committee members should be entitled to personal research assistance. This would provide support on party lines to Committee members. Without increased Committee staffs and member staffs, no Committee can have a sufficient impact on today's giant bureaucracy. In addition, Committees and their staffs will not be effective until there is a massive improvement in the information provided by Government. Certainly secrecy must be reduced and the Official Secrets Act replaced by an Act which embodies the right to know rather than the present right to conceal.
It is also time that a body was set up totally to review the regular financial information provided by Departments. At present we have one-year estimates, appropriation accounts and cash limits which do not tally with the five-year public expenditure survey, and we have wholly inadequate information on the objectives, results and impact of public spending programmes. All attempts to get a more informative accounting system have been stalled by successive Governments. Public accountability implies the right of Parliament to call the Executive to account for its actions. It is too weak

in this Legislature, and too few Members care about it.
I cannot see how parliamentary control can be strengthened until we have a House of Commons whose Members are willing to make a full-time job of it. It seems to me hypocritical to argue that Parliament is straining to exert more control over the Executive and at the same time to argue that MPs ought to combine the job with outside employment. Our approach to Parliament is still fundamentally amateurish. Our hours and sittings are organised as if we were all grouse-shooting lawyers. We would be in a better position to call the Executive to account if we sat in the mornings, worked normal hours, voted ourselves proper administrative and research support and faced up to the need to implement an independent valuation of Members salaries. Reform of parliamentary control should start here. It is certainly overdue.

4.47 p.m.

Mr. Cranley Onslow: If the hon. Member for Norwich, South (Mr. Garrett) thinks that the House ought to sit in the mornings, he ought to read the Crossman diaries. The late Richard Crossman thought that the House ought to sit in the mornings, but he was soon driven to conclude that it was a ludicrous experiment and had to admit that it was a failure. Many of the other contributions which the hon. Gentleman included do not stand any closer examination than that.
The truth is that our chances of bringing the Executive to account do not depend upon this House working social hours. They depend upon this House having power. The great difference, to which other hon. Members have rightly drawn attention, between what happens here and what happens in America is a great irony, because the American constitution is based on an analysis by a Frenchman of the way in which the Government of this country would have worked, if it worked at all, in the reign of George III. Being a Frenchman, and logical, he got it right, whereas we, being English and illogical, have successively got it more wrong as time has passed.
One can look through the history of this country and see power given away. Each successive step which has been taken


to make life easier for us as Members of this House has resulted in making life easier for the Government. I regret greatly the passing of the time-honoured rule whereby anyone who was made a member of the Cabinet had to stand for reelection at a by-election. I should like to see that come back. I am not merely concerned with some of the more recent gross dispersals of power, in which again Mr. Richard Crossman was involved. There was the abolition of the rule that a count could be called after 10 o'clock at night and the abolition of the time-honoured practice that debate on certain orders could go on until everyone had said his piece.
But so long as we are confined by the desire of some hon. Members to have life as easy in this House as they did outside, so long we shall continue to fall into the trap of supposing that our function here is to work as we would if we were not Members of Parliament, whereas our function here is to make life difficult for Government. We are sent here to do that and, in so far as we fail to do it, our constituents rightly ask what we are doing here.
Government supporters such as the how Member for Norwich, South feel that if they are busy, they must be doing a useful job. I am afraid that I could not disagree more with that proposition. Our task here is not to be busy. Our task here is to bring power to bear.
It is a very difficult task. No Government are more adept than this one at wriggling out of attempts to bring power to bear upon them. The Leader of the House probably will understand that I am about to return to a King Charles's head of my own when I say that there is no case which illustrates this better than that of John Stonehouse.
I believe that by now this House should have had a full, satisfactory and sufficient inquiry by an impartial body into whether Storehouse was a Czech spy. It is totally impossible to get it from this Government. Of course, it is a matter which goes back over time. The first statement on the subject was made back in December 1974 when the then Prime Minister startled the House by saying in terms that there was no evidence to show that Stonehouse was a Czech spy. Actually there was no evidence at the

time to show that Stonehouse existed any more. However, we know that he was at that time on his way back from Denmark to Australia as part of his elaborate plan of deception to conceal his very existence, and we have come to know since that Stonehouse's word is not a word to be relied upon. Several people have actually expressed that opinion in quite convincing terms.
One takes one's choice, having paid one's money. The person who takes one choice reads Stonehouse's book and the chapter entitled "The Czech Spy Story" and, if that person is an idiot, he thinks that there is nothing more to it than appears in that chapter. However, a person with any perception of human experience and human psychology can see that it is a load of rubbish, carefully concocted, as so much else of Stonehouse's written works were, in order to present an alibi to the world.
To suggest that there is no evidence that Stonehouse was a Czech spy is to disregard the evidence of Stonehouse himself and to disregard the evidence of a Czech defector, Mr. Frolik, whose name will be well enough known to the Leader of the House, who said in terms that Stonehouse was working for the Czechs and who took grave offence when the former Prime Minister said in this House that there was no evidence to show this.
All efforts since then to try to get these matters looked into by such an impartial body as a Security Commission have failed. All our efforts to try to persuade the Prime Minister to have a proper and systematic inquiry have ended in obfuscation. The latest letter which I have received from the Prime Minister is dismissive in the extreme.
There have been times in other cases where the suggestion that an hon. Member of this House was in contact with a foreign intelligence service has been taken more seriously. There have been times when we have been more fortunate in getting an inquiry into these matters. This, alas, is not one of them.
I cite the case of Stonehouse to show not that Government supporters do not wish to take the matter seriously, because that does not need to be proved, but that this House needs to assert the power which ought to lie within its hands


to get full satisfaction when it cares sufficiently about a matter to go on pressing it. I care sufficiently to go on pressing this. If I do not get an answer today, there will be another occasion.
But as a general matter of principle, I agree entirely with my right hon. Friend the Member for Taunton (Mr. du Cann) that we are the people who have to be satisfied because we owe this debt of satisfaction to our constituents. We are here to defend them against the abuses of Government, the inactions of Government, and the excuses and the vague and self-indulgent evasions of Government. We are the only people who can do this and, whether it is on the defence of the national security, on the defence of the national interest or on the expenditure of the taxpayers' money, we are the people who must stand here always and ask for more.
I ask that this motion be seen as a cry for this House to be given back the power which rightly belongs to it.

4.55 p.m.

Mr. Mike Thomas: Until the speech of the hon. Member for Woking (Mr. Onslow), this debate had been civilised and it had been to the point. The hon. Member did us a disservice by seeking to exploit this motion both for a party political purpose which he can never resist and also for the purpose of pursuing a particular vendetta which is his own. I do not propose to take up any of the matters which he raised, and I hope that he will understand why.
Reading The Times this morning, I saw in a profile of Mr. Peter Parker, the chairman of British Rail, what I regarded as a chilling statement. He repeated his idea that this country should in some way be at least in part governed by a council of industry—a bringing together of managers, trade unionists and others concerned in industry to form a sort of senatorial second House with what Mr. Parker described in the article, which was a profile of him with extensive quotations, "prior rights" over legislation and a number of other not legal powers but more constitutional powers which effectively would give such a council a very central position in the running of the country.
It must be said that Mr. Parker is a man for whom I have the greatest admiration, and I find that I agree with him on almost every issue except this one. I was chilled to read the article, because I believe that today's debate ought to concern itself with two matters. It ought first to be about the role of the corporate State and the way in which our society is now run and is now managed. If I may say so to my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner), who I know takes a different view from me about this and about all sorts of other aspects of parliamentary reform, if he wants to look for the dangerous consensus in our society, the dangerous consensus behind closed doors of managers, trade unionists and the Minister involved which is then presented as a fait accompli to this House is the most dangerous that we face today. This also relates to the question of open government, because it is there that the closed government is. It is in this place that we could get back to government more in the open, with people able to state their positions publicly.
The second matter with which we should concern ourselves—and again I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover will take issue with me—is the idea that we could govern this country better and more effectively if we introduced party politics further and further into every nook and cranny of consideration of every administrative and legislative proposal. I disagree profoundly with my hon. Friend about that, and perhaps I might say to my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich, South (Mr. Garrett) that it is the only aspect in which I disagree with the analysis by the Labour Party in its Green Paper which otherwise is an excellent and constructive document to which I shall return in a moment.
The nature of the problem is well known.

Mr. Skinner: Will my hon. Friend give way?

Mr. Thomas: My hon. Friend has plenty of time and, indeed, he does not need anyone to give way to him.

Mr. John Mendelson: That is not good enough. On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. As we are debating the customs of and the aim to improve


the procedures of the House, would it not be better to stick to the time-honoured tradition that if an hon. Member mentions another hon. Member and identifies him directly by reference to his constituency, he should give that hon. Member the chance to intervene?

Mr. Thomas: I was simply replying to statements which my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover had made in the past and with which I have never had an opportunity to deal. But if my hon. Friend wishes to intervene, I give way to him gladly.

Mr. Skinner: My hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, East (Mr. Thomas) should understand that my views on open government are just as strong as his own. On the question of Select Committees, it may be that he is unaware that the machinery of government group, of which I am a member, has put forward a proposal with which I generally agree that in order to keep the conflict in Select Committees, one way in which it could be achieved is by having separately staffed secretariats for all the political sides so that, instead of having to rely on some impartial body in the middle, the conflict would remain and, of course, it would have to be in front of the television cameras as well.

Mr. Thomas: I hope that my hon. Friend will accept that I do not differ with him on motives or objectives. But he will have to allow me to differ with him in his analysis and his prescriptions. In my view, some of them are right and some of them are wrong. Certainly I have disagreed profoundly with some of the views that he has voiced in the past.
As I was saying, the nature of the problem is well known. So necessary, apparently, has it become for the Government to consult and to bargain with pressure groups on both major planks of policy and the most extensive range of detailed matters that Parliament is faced constantly with fails accomplis. In matters of legislation and executive decision, the political majority is wheeled out to rubber-stamp the compromises to the corporate State. Parliament is often even kept in ignorance of the alternative courses of action considered in the horse-trading of interest groups with each other and the

Executive. This will usually have been conducted in an atmosphere of secrecy which is preserved within the Government by the doctrine of collective responsibility and in the interest groups by enjoinders not to encourage Parliament to upset the carefully stitched together compromise package eventually presented to it for fear that one change will undo a carefully sewn-up garment.
Worse still, on all but the most important issues, the sometimes terrifying lack of understanding of the work of Parliament and the political system by both sides of industry—and their marked preference for dealing with Ministers and civil servants out of the public eye—can sometimes lead to their acceptance in silence of a proposal which meets only their barest requirements—a lowest common denominator proposal. Its major elements and most intimate details are dictated by a Minister or, more likely, his civil servants, and wished upon the interest groups by vague talk of "difficulties" in getting any other set of proposals through Parliament.
The same Minister will then appear in Standing Committee defending such a measure against all amendment, while privately implying to Back Bench colleagues in his own party and sometimes publicly sayine to those on the Standing Committee that he would love to accept their proposals for changes and improvement but that to do so would upset the interest groups that he has consulted and undo firm promises that he has made to them.
Needless to say, that is not the attitude to Parliament of all or even a majority of Ministers. Nor is the temptation to behave in this fashion limited to one party or Government. However, it is a familiar description of the British political process at its present regular worst, and it will be familiar to many hon. Members, trade unionists, industrialists and lobbyists.
We cannot in this House do other than accept a large measure of responsibility for this state of affairs. Governments, in the nature of things, are usually elected with only the most generalised of manifestos. Within their parliamentary majority, there will be some general sense on major issues of the policies that should be given high priority and the decisions


up with which their parliamentary colleagues will not put. Between these two boundaries lies vast territory over which the Government may range. Internal democracy within the parliamentary parties is of a fairly rudimentary kind. That is a comment which can be applied to all the parliamentary parties except perhaps the very smallest.
In practice, Back Benchers are faced constantly with the problems of lack of resources, information and sheer time and are often driven at the end of the day to decide issues not on their merits but on grounds of whether it is a serious enough matter to be worth the opprobrium of upsetting the party Whips or joining the "rock the boat" school. When that happens, even when the party political content of the decision is imperceptible even with a microscope and the most determined observer, when Parliament is constantly predisposed by the system, by its procedure and by the inclinations of the Front Benches to operate like this, it is not surprising that the Government of the day effectively propose and dispose on all but the most important or the most trivial matters.
It is not wrong in principle that loyalty to Front-Bench colleagues and party should be in Members' minds. Quite the reverse, However, it is not right or good for parliamentary democracy that these considerations should be made to figure so prominently on almost every issue and that our parliamentary procedures should be so overwhelmingly designed to revolve around the party political axis, often at the expense of proper scrutiny of the Executive, of legislation and of political patronage.
In the midst of this has grown up the Select Committee in its post-war form. It was everyone's white hope for change, but on the whole it has not fulfilled its promise. I wonder why. First, I think that it is because on the whole Select Committees have accepted a post-hoc scrutinising role, thus rarely horning in on current policy-making. Secondly, it is because Select Committees have always had an air of ad hocery about them. Until very recently they were disbanded annually. Even now they survive only the length of a Parliament, and after an election it can sometimes be several months before they are reconstituted.
Thirdly, this uncertainty of existence has reflected itself in the failure to establish proper expert staffs rather than borrowed advisers. This point relates also to the fourth problem, namely a miserly lack of resources. Add to this the failure mentioned by other hon. Members on both sides of the House to establish, committees to shadow each Government Department, and the generally low political priority attached to the committees—most Back Benchers preferring to be the most junior Minister or menial Opposition spokesman to chairing a Select Committee—and we have some measure of the failure of Select Committees to live up to their expectations.
While we in the House must accept a large measure of responsibility for this, the comparison with the powerful committees of the United States Congress invites the making and helps to explain some of the problems. Our failure to separate the Executive and the legislature, as the Americans do, is the critical factor. I sometimes wonder whether it is not a fatal inhibitor to the attempts that are currently being made and have been made over the years to develop machinery whereby Parliament can really scrutinise the actions of the Executive and proposed legislation.
It is certainly the case that the growth of the disciplined party system and the confusion of the role of the Back-Bench Government party Member between sustainer and scrutiniser of the Executive is a major determinant of the Parliament's current weakness in the political power game. It is a weakness which to date has been extensively exploited by the Front Benches of both major parties. Parliament, in theory—Back Benchers are always in a considerable minority in the House—could take these matters in hand. However, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Bow (Mr. Mikardo) said earlier, in practice it is extraordinarily difficult. The Government, in conjunction with the Opposition Front Bench, dominate the organisation of the House and its business. Only they can table motions in the sure knowledge that they will be considered and decided. They effectively even decide which Select Committees there will he, or, as Members of the Select Committee on Agriculture found when they became troublesome in


the late 1960s, which Select Committees there will not be.
The Government and the Opposition Front Bench also have a large part to play in the powers given to the Select Committees and the personnel who serve on them. I have never got to the bottom of the matter, and no doubt I shall be corrected later in the debate if necessary—the right hon. Member for Taunton (Mr. du Cann) knows about this much more than I do, I suspect—but, the Treasury appears, in practice, to decide which financial and staff resources are made available.
In the post of my right hon. Friend the Lord President, there is the ultimate incarnation of the reality. As Leader of this House, he is charged with two wholly incompatible tasks. On the one hand, he is charged with getting the Government legislation through and, on the other hand, with protecting the rights of Back Benchers. I submit that those two roles are not compatible if they are to be pursued properly.
Despite all this, there are some encouraging signs that Back Benchers are genuinely determined to take back some of the power that has sapped away and that a significant number of Front Benchers of both major parties are sufficiently convinced that the present situation, while congenial and convenient, has so many drawbacks for the good of the parliamentary system as a whole that it cannot be allowed to continue unchanged.
Those who hold the view that Parliament is about translating the party or ministerial will unaltered into law or executive decision, or opposing it root and branch, depending on where one is sitting at the time, accompanied only by the sound of clashing ideologies displayed in grand debate, steadily diminish in numbers, although there are enough of them around to make the fight for change a real "knock' em down and drag' em out" affair.
But the fight is coming and the will for change is there. It should centre around four main issues. First, we must establish a real and detailed scrutiny of the Executive through departmental Select Committees. This is recommended in the Labour Party study group report, may

well be recommended by the Procedure Committee and is desperately needed. It will pose all sorts of problems. I mention them just to show those who will no doubt raise them to oppose such a proposal that those who are in favour of the proposal are aware of them.
Will the Committees include Front Benchers as well as Back Benchers? What powers of information will they need? Will they hamper ministerial capacity to make policies and progress affairs? What level of staffing should be provided? Will it amount to a shadow Civil Service? Will the Committees tend to operate on party lines? Will this reduce their effectiveness, as Ministers play the party card? These are fascinating questions, to which I suspect the answers will emerge only slowly as we put the idea into practice.
I am firmly convinced that departmental Select Committees developing their own expertise, able to subpoena papers and question Ministers, civil servants and interested groups systematically for hours at a time would return substantial effective scrutiny powers to Parliament which at present with the exception of some of the work of the Expenditure Committee are, in my view, hardly available. I believe that that would directly improve the quality of government in this country.
The second objective to be fought for is a dramatic improvement in parliamentary scrutiny of legislation. The largely ritual quadrilles of many of our current Standing Committee proceedings—incorporating for the Back-Bench participant an almost insupportable level of sheer tedium—are a grotesquely inadequate method of scrutinising legislation.
The Select Committee on Nationalised Industries, of which I am a member, is currently giving a series of pre-legislative hearings to those concerned with the draft Bill to reorganise the electricity industry, held up because of Liberal opposition and now published as a White Paper. It has already become clear in the course of these hearings that taking evidence on a Bill from interested parties in public has some very great advantages for Parliament. It is immediately clear who thinks what about the Bill and its provisions. The process of horse-trading in Whitehall whereby, whatever compromises are arrived at, everyone concerned


has a vested interest in defending them, is broken down.
Those affected by the Bill can put their case directly and all members of the Committee considering the Bill—assuming that pre-legislative hearings in Select Committee format were to become a regular precursor of Standing Committee proceedings—could hear its virtues and vices discussed openly before considering the Bill line by line.
Obviously, the process could not be allowed to delay legislation for ever. But in the case of legislation affecting a large number of groups or legislation of a highly contentious nature it would surely be justifiable for Parliament to take somewhat longer to consider a Bill than it would take for a matter of less importance.
Thirdly, I believe that Parliament must turn its attention to the appointments made by Ministers, which now total several thousand. I believe that these should be subject to parliamentary scrutiny and to direct affirmation by Parliament in the case of major appointments—the heads of nationalised industries, for example. For the most important appointments it should be possible for the Minister's nominee to be examined by a Select Committee and for the Committee to report to the House before an appointment is confirmed. Similarly, for major jobs, a ministerial appointee whom a Minister wished to dismiss before the end of an agreed term of office should have the right of appeal to Parliament.
Lastly, I believe that Back Benchers need to assert that the management and functioning and resources of Parliament ought not to be left to the Front Benches. The present arrangements for the organisation of business, the effective relegation of Private Members' time to matters of little consequence by making it impossible for matters of any controversy to be pursued to a successful—or even unsuccessful—conclusion without Government assistance—pace the Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Bow and others of my hon. Friends—the effective organisation of the rules of procedure to disallow decisions on any matters other than those the Front Benches want decided—the death-knell of many a Tribune Group amendment—the

provision that forbids even the official Opposition to move to increase taxes or public expenditure, the unsatisfactory arrangements—and I put it no higher than that—for the selection of members of Committees—the effective denial of real resources to Select Committees—these practices and procedures which Parliament has accumulated over the years are increasingly unacceptable to substantial numbers of Back Benchers of all parties.
The Labour Party study group made some useful suggestions on these points, not least on pre-legislative committees, with Select Committee-style powers to consider Bills, and specifically the recommendation for departmental scrutiny committees. I believe the study group to be right to do so. These are practical and constructive suggestions. However, there are three things that should not be overdone.
First, we should not confuse the present difficulties of the Government over their legislative programme with any problems of parliamentary procedure. The Government's problems are fundamentally to do with the lack of majority. They are not essentially to do with parliamentary procedure. We should have that clear in our minds because it will lead to muddled thinking if, in some way, we think that parliamentary procedure is responsible for the Government losing the occasional vote.

Mr. Beith: Does not the hon. Member agree that the present situation demonstrates that when a sufficient number of hon. Members have a mind to change what the Government propose it is then, and only then, that that happens?

Mr. Thomas: I agree. That is true. But the fact is that if the Government are in a minority of 13 or 15 or whatever, in the nature of things that is different from when the Government have an absolute majority in this House of their own party. Neither the Government nor my hon. Friends nor Members of the Opposition can take the blame or the credit, depending on where they are sitting, for the fact that on occasions, in these circumstances, the Government lose a vote. It is not parliamentary procedure which causes that. It is the position of the parties within the House.
Secondly, we have to be absolutely clear that—here I quote from the Labour Party document—
to help the executive push its policies through against opposition in Parliament, against outside and vested interests and maybe against the opposition of the Civil Service
may not be an objective to which the Parliamentary Labour Party attaches as great an importance to in opposition—if it is in opposition—as it does when Labour is in Government. We have to be quite clear that there are the rights of minorities—that the Government have rights and that the Opposition have rights. We have to be able to perceive ourselves as sitting occasionally in the opposite seats.
Thirly, we should not assume that the reform of Parliament must necessarily involve the strengthening within Parliament of the party political process. Indeed, if I may return to my opening theme, I would take second place to no one in arguing that the importance of party politics, of ideology and the discussion of political principles is vital to this House. It is a vital consideration when we are deciding major issues. However, I believe that it is the constant elevation of every trivial matter to the rhetorical heights of party politics that is a prime cause of Parliament's current weakness and a prime cause of the low esteem in which Parliament is held in the public eye.
I also believe that it is a profound mistake, which we shall live to regret, to broadcast live only the most ritual and partisan of all parliamentary proceedings, namely, Prime Minister's Question Time. I do not believe that the public's response to this has necessarily been favourable, and I refer not to the Conservatives, not to the Leader of the Opposition, not to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, but to Parliament as an institution and to Members of Parliament when I say that.
It is interesting to note that certainly until three months ago the opinion polls showed that, whereas "politicians" were of low esteem in the public mind, "Members of Parliament" were not. Members of Parliament tended to be held in high esteem, particularly individual Members of Parliament. "My Member of Parliament" is something with which many

people feel a positive identification. I believe that this selective broadcasting—and I make it clear that I am in favour of broadcasting and televising our proceedings—might diminish the Member of Parliament as an individual and as part of our society in the view of the public. It is the constant elevation of trivial matters to rhetorical heights of party politics that is the prime cause of Parliament's current weakness.
We must be clear that it is the application of party political loyalties and rhetoric to every issue which is the instrument of Back-Bench emasculation in this House. While I share with my colleagues in the Labour Party the desire to reform and change this House and its institutions, I say that we must be careful how we do this. Let us not introduce party politics into every administrative consideration, into every legislative proposal. Let us try to be discriminating. Above all, let us get on with it. If we fail to move, if the momentum were to develop for a council of industry, for a senate, for a quasi-legislative, quasi-governmental body which institutionalised the embryo of the corporate State as it stands in this country at the moment, it would be the death knell of Parliament. It would be the end of us all in here, and I believe that it would be the end of many of the institutions we care for so dearly.

5.19 p.m.

Mr. Dudley Smith: My right hon. Friend the Member for Taunton (Mr. du Cann) is to be congratulated on bringing forward this motion today because it is one of the most important to have been debated in this Chamber for some time. I regret, as I am sure do many other hon. Members, the lack of time that we have to debate the subject and the fact that some speeches have been rather lengthy. I shall endavour to be as brief as possible.
Recently there was an important lecture given by Lord Croham of Croydon who is better known as Sir Douglas Allen, the distinguished former head of the Civil Service, in which he said that he thought that Parliament was beginning to exert its power over the Executive. I was fortunate enough to take part in the recent all-party discussion with the noble Lord via the British Institute of Management. I am glad to say that hon. Members from both


sides of the House were much against the view put forward by Lord Croham. It was felt that the power of the Executive was growing day by day.
Lord Croham instanced the departing powers of this legislature to the EEC. He talked about Select Committees. I take the view that the Civil Service is becoming more deeply entrenched, and that that gives a strong stiffening to the Government of the day. I believe that the noble Lord is wrong in his analysis.
It may be that we have seen an advance with the establishment of Select Committees, but as the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, East (Mr. Thomas) said. Select Committees still leave a great deal to be desired. They still remain properly to be fulfilled. On the other hand, the advance of Select Committees can be equated by a more powerful Executive that is bent on achieving its will, come hell or high water.
Successive Governments of recent times have over-legislated, and this Government most of all. As a result, much of the legislation that comes before the House is not even discussed. The whole exercise becomes a steamroller operation and the only tactic open to the Opposition, whichever Government are in power, is that of delay.
The Standing Committee procedure is a farce, apart from the present exceptional circumstances—the fashionable term is a hung Parliament—in which we have narrow voting in Committee. However, in a normal Parliament the party lines are drawn up from the start and even the most modest amendments are summarily rejected by the Government of the day. I am sure that right hon. and hon. Members of various Governments who have been in charge of Bills in Committee will remember reasonable amendments being put forward by Opposition Members an behalf of their party, or as individual Back Benchers, only to be advised strongly by the Civil Service and their Departments that they should not be accepted because they might cause an imbalance in the Bill.
The Back Bencher today is relatively powerless. His Questions are brushed aside. Anyone who has the slightest degree of competence may operate successfully from the Government Dispatch Box at Question Time. It is the easiest

thing in the world to dodge a difficult Question, given the back-up that Ministers enjoy. Back Benchers' speeches, however brilliant they may be in argument, will not be accepted by the Government of the day. In the House it is almost impossible to get an argument accepted by persuasive methods in a debate.
The Back Bencher is left at the end of the day with the opportunity of taking his case, especially if it is a constituency matter, to the Ombudsman, who is becoming something of a universal aunt for Members of Parliament. The latest development is that the Ombudsman is submitting that he should have the opportunity of taking complaints direct from the public. That raises difficult questions.

Mr. Anthony Buck: Mr. Anthony Buck (Colchester)rose—

Mr. Smith: No, I shall not give way. I promised to be brief. I want to give other hon. Members a chance to participate.
We are seeing a weakening of the power of individual Members, which should be watched most carefully. A Member's main hope is to persuade enough of his fellows, if he is on the Government Benches, to rebel on an issue if he is to succeed in bringing about a change. He is likely to be successful only if he can get a sufficient number to agree with him. It has to be a matter of major principle or of political necessity. Even in Opposition it is extremely hard to get the motivation of one's colleagues unless it is an issue of outstanding political importance.
Either deliberately or unwittingly—sometimes it is a mixture of both—the Executive has drawn a good deal of sting out of the Back Bencher by giving him more and more to do. I do not agree with the hon. Member for Norwich, South (Mr. Garrett), who spoke about the need for full-time Members of Parliament. Contrary to the public's concept, the majority of Members in this place—many of them are part-time—work extremely hard and have multitudinous duties. There is a handful who do not, but such persons will be found in any society. The more that Members have to do—our duties grow year by year—the less chance they have of attending debates in the Chamber, participating and


making their mark on Government legislation.
One of the reasons for the decline in the power of Parliament as against the Executive is that the focus of Westminster has moved away from the Chamber, despite the fact that broadcasting has been introduced. Apart from Question Time, which is now vested with artificial importance because of broadcasting, debates are badly attended. Attendance is poorer than at any time I can remember in the years that I have been a Member. Surely that must be a bad thing.
There is never sufficient time for debates to be properly conducted. There is not the opportunity to give way to opponents or colleagues. One shirks from following the previous speaker for fear of taking too long. Consequently, we do not have debates in the accepted sense of the word outside. They are set pieces in which hon. Members from both sides of the House get across their point of view. There is no even flow throughout our debates, except on rare occasions. Those occasions are usually when constitutional crises have arisen.
Given all these circumstances, it behoves us seriously to consider the procedures of the House if we are to hope in the months and years ahead, whichever party happens to be in power, to have some check on the growth of the Executive. We have seen the power of hon. Members slipping away with the extension of nationalised industries and bodies outside Parliament. They have day-to-day accountability of their own and hon. Members cannot challenge them, except indirectly.
In many ways, Parliament is rather like a county council that I remember some 15 years ago. It spent an hour and a half debating whether the district nurse should have a new bicycle, but passed on the nod a resolution for a new building that even in those days was to cost a quarter of a million pounds.
The ordinary elector's feeling of impotence as regards democratic representation will grow until the Executive is seen to be less in total command and until his Member of Parliament can be seen to be more successful in even occasionally having an influence on events. That is why debates of this sort are

extremely important, and that is why we should have more of them.

5.28 p.m.

Mr. Dennis Skinner: I, too, welcome the debate. I do not want to re-cover some of the ground that has already been covered, except to take up a few remarks that have been made, principally by my colleagues, on Select Committees.
It is hardly likely that Select Committees will go away. They have been with us for a considerable number of years. Of course, we may be upset from time to time about some of the reports that they produce, but we need to ensure that they are fashioned so that they represent conflict as opposed to consensus. I and others have said that Select Committees should be separately staffed along political lines. If that were done in the full public gaze, the result would be separate reports instead of the mealy-mouthed reports that come from cosy Select Committees as they are now constituted.
The motion is not merely about Select Committees but about the control of the Executive. We must consider where the power is currently being assembled to a greater degree. In my view the power of the Prime Minister and that of the Cabinet have grown considerably as the years have passed. Recently there has been a great deal more legislation. There is no doubt about that. Parliament sits more often.
If I had more time, I could tell the House an amusing anecdote about a Tory MP who bumped into me on the train one day. The hon. Member concerned said that in 1959—not that long ago—he and his pair agreed to get away for the whole of the summer, and it was then only Whitsuntide. They did not turn up here again until October. He said that there was nothing wrong with that, but that now we had a lot of new people—I think that he was looking at me—and they were bound by a tremendous amount of legislation. I do not think that we can argue about legislation. It is the way in which we deal with it that is important and the way in which we look at it from the standpoint of the Prime Minister and the Cabinet.
Therefore, at the very beginning I want to reduce the patronage of the Prime


Minister, the Cabinet and other Ministers. The first thing is to ensure that the Prime Ministers of the day—I can talk only in terms of the Labour side; I do not know much about the Tory Opposition—is subject to a greater degree of accountability.
At present, no one can argue but that the Prime Minister is almost impregnable. It is true that we are in the run-up to a General Election. Therefore, many Members are not saying what they would say in other situations. In fact, I get pulled over the coals for continuing to do it. I have got it in my bloodstream. Several others of my hon. Friends do the same as I.
The point that I am trying to establish is that the Prime Minister has tremendous power. One way to curb that power is to have a fixed term of Parliament—a four-year term—so that we know precisely how long Parliament will go on, as I pointed out to the Liberal, the hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith). All the Liberals are missing. Every time I stand up to speak in the House of Commons, the Liberals have gone. I do not think that it has any thing to do with me. The fact is that they are never here. They make speeches and off they go. I should be rebuked by Mr. Speaker if I did that.
The point that I want to make is that, in order to get this reduction of power in the patronage of the Prime Minister, we must have a fixed term of Parliament. We should not then have the sword of Damocles hanging over the heads of MPs who did not know whether to rebel—not rebel, but to vote or not to vote for something constructive because of the party Whips and so on—because of possibly bringing down the Government. That would not apply in a fixed term of Parliament.
We must reduce patronage. In this regard, I think that we must have an elected Cabinet. When in Opposition—I am talking about the Parliamentary Labour Party—we go through the democratic process of electing a Shadow Cabinet. It is true that we elect only 12, but due account is taken of runners-up and so on. But when we get into power, we tend to discard that democratic process and to hand over to the Prime Minister the chance of deciding the

hundred-odd Members of Parliament and a few from the House of Lords who are to form the Government.
In my view, while it might be a long-drawn-out ballot to elect those hundred-odd Members, we could have a system similar to the Australian system or the system which we operate for our Shadow Cabinet elections so that the Cabinet is decided by election. I do not suggest that it would result in Left wingers being elected to the Cabinet: of course not. We should probably finish up with much the same position as we have now.
My right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, who will answer the debate, always figured prominently in the Shadow Cabinet elections, despite the fact that at that time, almost without exception, the whole of the Right wing detested all that he stood for. I am not sure about that now. He has tended to mellow a bit as a result of the passage of time and of having had responsibility thrown upon him in the past few years.
The Cabinet must be elected. It is not a laughing matter. The idea of having an elected Cabinet is to ensure that the Prime Minister does not have the power to hire and fire in the manner that he does now. In a Committee of about 21 Members, usually eight will do what the gaffer says, whatever happens, for fear of the sack. They can be shifted around like dominoes in a pack because they will do almost anything to keep their jobs.
Under a system of accountability, there would be a different operation. The balance of power would be shifted from the Prime Minister to this caucus, which would be the Parliamentary Labour Party. We must consider, and have already considered, the question of ensuring that the Prime Minister is accountable not to the PLP but to the party as a whole. That, again, would tend to shift power from the Prime Minister. I think that the Liberals have to some extent looked at and dealt with this matter in a fashion. However, it is a matter that Members from all parties should consider. We must ensure that the Prime Minister of the day does not have the power that he wields at present.

Mr. John Mendelson: Generally, I have a fair amount of sympathy with the points being expressed by my hon. Friend. But does he agree that recent events


make it doubtful whether this doctrine is always correct? When we consider the reports of the Select Committees on the steel industry and on immigration and see the reactionary policies to which some of our colleagues committed themselves in unity with some Tory Members, I say thank God for the Cabinet and the Prime Minister who rescued us from our own colleagues.

Mr. Skinner: I do not think that my hon. Friend is disagreeing with my main argument. He has made a point which he has made on several occasions. I am trying to explain that we should still have a Cabinet to override Select Committee decisions or to put them in their places. I want to shift the power away from the Prime Minister. I suggest that there should be a democratic test, which would have to take place among those who are elected to Parliament. We do it in Opposition, but for some strange reason we forget all about it when we are in power.
I understand that the Prime Minister and his departmental Ministers have about 4,000 jobs that they are able to cast around.

Mr. William Hamilton: There are more than that.

Mr. Skinner: My hon. Friend the Member for Fife, Central (Mr. Hamilton), who follows these matters generally, suggests that there are more than 4,000. I accept that there are more, but I have seen a figure of about 4,000 top jobs. My hon. Friend may be including some lower down the list. I am saying that those jobs should also be subject to some form of democratic test and taken away from the Prime Minister.
I think that the same argument must apply to the Honours List. If we are to reduce the power of patronage, that must go as well. It is not a question of having another system in its place. Frankly, I do not see the purpose of it. Therefore, that should be shifted away from the patronage of the Prime Minister. The whole movement away from the Prime Minister and the Cabinet would, in my view, give more power to elected Members as a whole.
Those are two of the matters which I think are important as regards taking control away from the Executive.
Mention has already been made of pre-legislative committees. I agree with that suggestion. There is nothing better than to be able to examine a Bill thoroughly in some pre-legislative form before it comes to Parliament. I think that point was mentioned by the right hon. Member for Taunton. That would improve the situation.
No one has mentioned the Civil Service. Civil servants have tremendous power. When talking about control of the Executive, we cannot take them out of the picture. They are there all the time, whatever party is in power. We should not adopt the maxim of most Members—that we should not say anything about civil servants because they are following their masters and putting forward their views. I do not accept that at all. I tend towards the view that anyone working in that kind of environment is bound to come to some positive conclusions about what he wants to see. Civil servants by and large are drawn from a very narrow stratum of society—right at the top. They work in an environment and have financial terms which are better than those of the average man on the Clapham omnibus. Therefore, my guess is that they are shaped in such a way that they will not reflect the views of the man on the Clapham omnibus. Therefore, there must be a change in the Civil Service.
Although few would agree with me, I should like to see a greater degree of politicising in the Civil Service based on the party that comes to power. A few slight moves have been made in that direction recently by taking in political advisers. With due respect to all of them, by and large, compared with the perennial run-of-the-mill civil servants, they are small beer. I want to see a change in that direction so that the civil servants do not have the same kind of power.
Mention has also been made of the State boards and the QUANGO jobs that are handed round the various top trade union leaders. I do not think that one can talk about the control of the Executive or Government without taking into account that trade union leaders, as distinct from trade union members, are now wielding tremendous power. Contrary to the popular view that they are wielding power in order to improve the members standards and conditions, in recent times trade union leaders have been working


with the Goverenment in order to reduce and repress the living standards of the members.
When the right hon. Member for Sid-cup (Mr. Heath) was in power the trade union leaders were encouraged to go to No. 10 Downing Street, or Chequers, to try to carve up the so-called national cake. We cannot talk about the role of the Executive here without taking into account the way in which trade unions wield tremendous power in the State machine.
We all know—and it is no use hiding this—that many trade union leaders finish up in the Lords as a result of decisions taken at certain conferences during the year. If they do not get a job over there, they are put on the NEB or given other posts that the Prime Minister can hand out. That, too, must be changed. It is not just a question of dealing with Parliament in isolation. If we are to control the Executive it must be across a wider range.
It has been suggested that we should have full-time MPs. Of course we should. I have not said anything about the right hon. Member for Taunton, who introduced the debate, but he has quite a number of jobs. They are all in the Register. Many other hon. Members have other jobs. If we are to be inundated with legislation in the way described by almost every speaker in the debate, we need Members who can concentrate, night and day and all the time, on these issues. Some people argue that we want Members from all walks of life so that they know a little about the issues. It is said that we need people who practise in the law and know about business. I came from the pits. I cannot work in a pit in London and do this job. That applies to train drivers. It applies to many Members especially on this side of the House. It also applies to some Opposition Members. If we are to control the Executive we must have full-time MPs.
I have changed the Whipping system. The Chief Whip has helped to get me in this debate.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Michael Cocks): No.

Hon. Members: Patronage.

Mr. Skinner: I was just checking that out because my right hon. Friend the Chief Whip was nodding and winking. I

thought that I had better clear the air. I think that I managed to catch the Deputy Speaker's eye on the basis of principle.
When a Member of Parliament comes here one of the first things that he is told is how to get away from the place. That applies to both sides. I do not know what lectures the Liberals have. Tory and Labour Members are always asked "Have you got a pair?" and they hang around looking for one another. If we are to have full-time Members of Parliament we do not want a pairing system which is based on the ability to get away.
Why do Whips want to get people away? It is so that they can say on occasions when the Government are in trouble "I helped you out twice last week. Let us have you in the Lobby tonight because I know that you want to get away early for your holidays." I refuse to take part in that system. I know that is clipping my wings. I want to see that changed. The control of the Executive would be strengthened if more Members of Parliament said to the Whips "You are doing a good job. Your job is to get people here as distinct from allowing them favours and to get away."
The same is true of parliamentary trips. Too many hon. Members indulge in trips abroad. Select Committees are set up for all kinds of reasons. On nearly every occasion the members of those Committees find a reason for a trip. For example, they might examine a nationalised industry. Before one can say "Jack Robinson" they have gone to Japan or America to have a look there. There should be a curb on activities in that direction.
Many improvements can be made but one thing is ultra-important: if 635 Members, minus members of the Government, turned in here day after day, without pairing, without bothering with trips, to watch the Executive, to keep their eyes on the Lord President and Chief Whip and the rest of them—as I try to do every day—these people would not get away with a great deal. That is not to say that we do not want changes. Of course we do. Some of them have already been illustrated.
I finish on the issue of the Common Market. I think that the right hon.


Member for Taunton has a check. I say that without malevolence, of which I am always accused. He and other hon. Members have got a cheek to talk about the way in which we are being burdened by Britain's entry into the Common Market. They voted for it. Some hon. Members say that they abstained on the main issue. But if all those who abstained on the main issue and the rest of us had joined together on Second Reading and the Liberals had not played their game on the fateful night, we should not have gone into the Common Market and the control of the Executive would have been strengthened even more.
My appeal to hon. Members is that if they want to control the Executive, they should do many of the things that have been discussed today. But if they really want control, they should come down here and earn their corn. Let us have clocking on and clocking off for a change. What about that? We cannot grumble. We do not have to go for injury benefit or sickness benefit. We do not have to see the doctor to get a club note. Most of my constituents do. We do not have those problems.
If hon. Members really want to cut down the burden and ensure that Parliament is not inundated with all the regulations and directives from the Common Market—some in foreign languages, some that are late, some that are early, some that have not been discussed, some that will never be discussed, some that are trivial—let us get out of the Common Market. That is the best step that we can take.

5.49 p.m.

Mr. Kenneth Warren: I agree with much of what the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) said. Having listened to him, it strikes me that we are living in a world of fantasy. He and many other hon. Members in the debate have brought to the Floor of the House a degree of reality which neither the hon. Member for Bolsover nor I have seen in the eight years that we have enjoyed service in the House. It is good that we should have this kind of debate. I am very grateful, as I am sure are many other hon. Members, to my right hon. Friend the Member for Taunton (Mr. du Cann) for his initiative in bringing forward this subject.
Over the years here, we have seen the power of the State grow and grow. I think that it is only recently that we have had our minds and eyes focused on the way in which, as that power has grown, the distance of the Executive from this Parliament has multiplied. It has become more and more difficult for us to find out what is being done in the name of this House or in the names of the citizens whom we represent. I believe that Parliament must accept this entirely as its own responsibility and not blame anyone else.
This House has 635 Members. With the exception of some of them, I think that one would not say at any time that we have too few. In fact, we have far too many. One of the problems of this place is that we have far too many people able to take part in debates and we are not able, because of that, to deploy our arguments as we should like. Not all of us have the gift of the gab, as has the hon. Member for Bolsover. Therefore, it takes us longer to deploy our own views and arguments. We need more opportunity, which cannot come. Because it cannot come, we cannot hope properly to control the Executive.
Indeed, I am worried that we might have lost control of the Executive. One must ask what exactly the Executive consists of. It consists not only of the Government Front Bench but, as has been briefly mentioned by certain hon. Members present this afternoon, of the tens of thousands in the army of civil servants up and down the land who, although they are supposed to be faceless, certainly act in secrecy in our names.
Without doubt, one of our problems is the long hours that we work. I would join the hon. Member for Bolsover in clocking on for overtime, double time, or treble time, as the case may be. However, the fact is that those long hours and the will of the Whips on both sides have bred in this House a fatigue factor which destroys its competence. It not only does that. It reduces the efficiency of Ministers. I do not find the Government or this House any the better, whichever Government are in power, for the long hours that Members have to put in, both here and in their constituencies, if they are to do their job reasonably and to the best of their ability.
I know of no other legislature in Western Europe that works these long hours. Nor do I find that any of the performances of Governments over the last 10 or 20 years have justified these long hours in terms of the way in which the economic success of this country could be measured. I know that Ministers will argue that they cannot accept such a heresy, but I hope that they will accept that there is a major problem here which has repeatedly confounded the heroic efforts of successive British Governments.
Rather than just complaining about this, I should like to propose one or two remedies, on top of the many which have been put forward here this afternoon and, think, accepted by most of the House.
I have referred to the too many Members of Parliament. We are badly paid and badly staffed, and the country gets the kind of Members of Parliament that it deserves from that.
Secondly, I believe that there must be a system of management control, which can be exemplified by the pioneering work of Committees such as the Public Accounts Committee. There must be a visible method of management control from the Parliament of the Executive. This is not a matter just of the Government running their own machines. It is a question of assurance that proper, effective and relevant management control of the Executive can take place on the Floor of the House.
At present we have very little idea of the efficiency of the work of the Civil Service. Among its number there are many thousands of dedicated, hard-working men and women. I hope and believe that they would appreciate that it is in their own direct interests for them to be visibly accountable to Parliament. The whole of their work is virtually shrouded in secrecy. Parliament makes the probes that have been referred to this afternoon in terms of Select Committees, but none of these is really a substitute for open management and open government.
The next need is to cast off the ridiculous cloak of secrecy that surrounds so much of the general workings of the British Government. With the reservations that the House does not expect to know the innermost secrets of the State, those relating, for instance, to the plans for the

defence of the nation, and nor would Parliament want to probe at the privacy of the individual, the vast span of the apparatus of the State should be open to our inquiries and those of the ordinary citizen.
I welcome the recent attempt by the hon. Member for Birmingham, Perry Barr (Mr. Rooker) to find out the current state of play of the existing matters about which Ministers refuse to answer in the House. In 1971–72, when the list was last published, it stood at a total of 95 separate items, including such mighty secrets of the State as the workings of the British Sugar Corporation, the machinations of the White Fish Authority, questions about ferry services in Scotland, reasons for appointing members of hospital boards and rents paid by the Sports Council. If these are all matters which, if disclosed, would grant success to a Russian invasion, we might as well wrap up the Ministry of Defence.
It is from information supplied by that unfortunate Ministry that I should like to demonstrate the stupidity of the Government's secrecy. On 6th April this year I asked the Secretary of State for Defence about the progress of the memorandum of understanding, the two-way street, on defence sales, about which strong views are held by many hon. Members but on which depend tens of thousands of jobs and the expenditure of tens of millions of pounds of taxpayers' money. I was given the usual brush off that it was not in the public interest to give such information.
However, if I go to the United States of America and ask there, with the right that I have as a foreigner, even in the United States, for this information about the memorandum of understanding to be given to me, the United States Government are obliged to give it to me under their Freedom of Information Act. Yet at the very moment that I get that information, the pantomime escalates, because at the precise moment that I receive it I can then be charged in this country under the Official Secrets Act for having secret information.
I hope that the Lord. President will turn his attention not only to the question of the rather limited reform of the Official Secrets Act about which he has talked but to the need, about which I should like


to deploy arguments on another occasion, that the people of this country and certainly this House have for a proper freedom of information Act.
Finally, I think that all of us as politicians have encouraged for far too long a belief in Britain that the art and science of politics can save us from the realities of our world. Society is in trouble because Parliament has substituted the State for the individual as the centre of its life. Although I was interested to hear from the hon. Member for Bolsover of the machinations that go on inside the Labour Party, it is completely contrary to the centripetal action and wishes of Socialism to deploy the arguments that he had there for a more open election system of the Cabinet. But it is in this House that Parliament finds itself weighing down society in that there is now such a mass of legislation and statutes that the citizen has no idea of what his rights are or in which direction he can turn for help. At the close of play on 9th May 1978 there were 3,453 valid Acts of Parliament and 12,479 valid statutes. That is ridiculous. It is a nonsense.
In summation, this means that we in this House have permitted the transfer of the right of privacy of the individual to the rights of the State. Our lives as individuals, as citizens, are open. The State has become a secret. Politicians have repeatedly encouraged citizens to believe that the man in Whitehall must know best—because there are so many of them. To this end, we have legislated so far and so fast that, as the Prime Minister himself said only last week, every third citizen in this country is now working for the State. If parity is reached, everyone in commerce and industry will have a shadow brother in the coils of the State.
From the citizen we have extracted freedom. From the citizen we have taken his privacy. To the State we have given security. I believe that if we do not watch this erosion of freedom and privacy, Parliament will have failed in its duty to the citizen and to democracy.
We need a bonfire of legislation. We must stop pretending that the next Act of Parliament will open the gates to the promised land. There is much to do to

help the citizen and to improve society. Above all, I believe that we must remove the apparatus of the Executive from the position that it has seized from the citizen as the centre of British society.

6.0 p.m.

Mr. Michael Stewart: We may have underestimated the extent to which this House, when it really wishes, can impose its will on the Government. I am not speaking merely of Parliaments like the present one, where the Government have barely a majority, if a majority at all. I can remember instances where one party or another had a clear working majority but where, over such matters as the government of London, the organisation of National Service immediately after the war, the organisation of some of the nationalised industries or housing and rent legislation—

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: Or Maplin.

Mr. Stewart: I am obliged to the hon. Member—the House, in the event, obliged the Government to change their minds.
How was that done? First, it was done because there was a group of Members—my hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Bow (Mr. Mikardo) drew attention to the importance of this—with specialised knowledge of the subject, who hammered away at it. Secondly, it happened because of party spirit, because they were able to rally their comrades in their own party to their support. Thirdly, it was because they were able to get a response from the public outside—that is to say, by informed propaganda.
So it can be done. Admittedly, it is exceptional, but, after all, a Parliament in which it was exceptional for the Government to get their own way would not on any analysis be a very effective form of Government. Therefore, we may be in danger of underestimating the power of hon. Members when they really have the will.
Another example is the Ombudsman himself, who is the creation of Parliament and who has had a profound influence, not on major matters of policy, of course, but on administration. Some of the things that hon. Members say are hidden by the machinations of the Civil Service are opened up when the Ombudsman inquires. Some of the abuses which have grown up just through lack of


attention to problems are cured. That is the kind of thing that the House itself has done through the official that it appoints or who is responsible to it.
So let us keep a sense of proportion. I am not prepared fully to accept the picture of a power-hungry Executive gradually grinding down the House—or the citizen, as the hon. Member for Hastings (Mr. Warren) suggested. Much of the legislation which we pass does not take rights away from the citizens but confers rights on him.
One subject on which we continually have to legislate is the way in which the Welfare State works, because, with experience, we learn that there are misfortunes, disabilities and so on which we had not allowed for and that we must introduce legislation to improve the working of the Welfare State. That is not a taking of liberty from, but a conferring of rights on, people.
In comparison with my arguments about the danger of overestimating the limitations of the power of this House, I look with alarm on some of the remedies which have been proposed. It is interesting that the right hon. Member for Taunton (Mr. du Cann), to whom we are greatly indebted, speaks in his motion about the importance of increasing the influence of Parliament, yet his major proposal was for a written constitution which would take sovereignty from this House once and for all. His reason was his fear that we might one day see in power an extremist Government from one party or another.
"Extremist" means someone who goes further than we should like him to go: we all understand that. So the right hon. Gentleman is saying "I am afraid that one day there will be a Government who will do things that I do not like. That could happen under our present constitution, so we must alter our constitution." I am not prepared to accept that.
In addition to a written constitution, it is suggested, we would have a fixed-term Parliament, leaving the Prime Minister sometimes in the miserable situation of having to go on governing whether he wanted to or not. I do not believe that good government would be the result of that.
My hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, East (Mr. Thomas) wanted to separate the legislature from the Executive.

Mr. Anthony Grant: I do not quite understand the right hon. Gentleman's argument about fixed-term Parliaments. Surely a Prime Minister could resign if he wanted to within the term.

Mr. Stewart: I accept that, but since the majority in Parliament would be the same, some other member of his party would have to go on. The party would have to go on carrying the responsibility of government at a time when Parliament apparently was denying it the power to do the things which it believed were necessary for government. That is the drawback of fixed-term Parliaments.
Consider how it works in the United States. We see there what my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, East wanted—the separation of the legislature from the executive power. The United States has that for certain historical reasons. But I cannot see why any country which does not have that system should deliberately embrace it, because it has a number of drawbacks.
There have been grave instances in history when the great power of the United States could have been exercised in the world for good and was not so exercised because of the division of power and weakness at a vital moment. If it had not been for that separation of powers, the United States would probably have become a member of the League of Nations after the First World War, with incalculably beneficial results for the future development of mankind. That is not an isolated instance.
I admit that arguments can be piled up on the other side. I am simply urging a little caution before we take a device of a written constitution from one country and a device of separation of powers from another and start tacking them on to our constitution without considering how the resulting hybrid will work.
The American President, for these reasons, works in situations of great difficulty, but at least he can choose his own Cabinet. If my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) had his way, the British Prime Minister would not he


able to do that. He would have to work with people whom he had never chosen to work as a team. Every time one of them resigned or for any other reason left the Government, presumably there would have to be an election within the governing party to choose his successor. All that would be very well if one did not in the end want the Prime Minister and the Government actually to get something done in Parliament.
What I am afraid of, with all the remedies proposed, is that everyone would be so absorbed with the way in which the constitution was working that it would not produce many results. I understand that is what a number of Conservative Members want. They do not want legislation because on the whole they feel that the present distribution of wealth, power and opportunity in the country suits them nicely. They say "We would prefer to have things as they were 30 years ago, but failing that we do not want the system altered any more." That is why they want all these safeguards on the constitution—to make it difficult for the Government to govern at all.
I can understand why the Liberals would want this change, because if I follow Liberal philosophy—

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: Does the right hon. Gentleman?

Mr. Stewart: —if I do—it seems to be that it does not matter so much what one decides so long as the process of decision is protracted as far as possible and as many people as possible take part in the discussion.
I can understand a Communist or a Fascist wanting these elaborations of the constitution, because anything which makes the working of democracy more elaborate and cumbrous and helps to discredit it is grist to his mill.
What I find it difficult to understand is why a Democratic Socialist who wants, by the methods of British democracy, to introduce substantial changes into the economic and social order should want to make the business of government so cumbrous as it would be if many of the suggestions made today were adopted.
I hope that I am not so obscurantist as to object to all changes. My hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Bow

made some admirable and useful suggestions which I hope will be pursued, but I was a little worried when he talked of the "confrontation" between the Secretary of State and the Select Committee.
If we manage to ensure that members of a Select Committee are chiefly interested in themselves as facing the Government, they will begin to feel that they have more in common with their fellow members of the Committee of another party than thy have with the Minister, who may of their own party. If that happens, it will be difficult for the Government to be sure from week to week what their majority is.
The American Administration has to fact this problem, but at least it does so in the certainty that its Parliament cannot turn it out of office. A British Government, who could be sacked by a vote of Parliament, and who constantly saw the loyalties of some of their supporters being eroded by the working of Select Committees would be in a position of great weakness. I do not want Governments to be weak.
I accept a number of the detailed criticisms by the hon. Member for Hastings which were of great value. I followed with great interest some of his comments about unnecessary secrecy. These matters can be studied. But the case has not been made for major constitutional changes. If we made such changes we should leave ourselves with an emasculated Government. I believe that some of the best Governments in this country have been those who have had a clear conviction of what they believed was right, a parliamentary majority, and loyal support from it to enable them to carry the broad elements of their policies.
In many ways we are very fortunate in our form of government. No one person can claim to have thought it out. But I still take the view that the English people—and I say that with respect to the Scots and the Welsh, because this has been mainly an English contribution—have shown a considerable talent for creating the machinery of civilised government.
I am aware that criticisms may be made of us and that because of our present economic difficulties some people assume that everything must be wrong with this country. I do not believe that to


be true. I believe that we have a form of government that enables us to make party conflict civilised and to make progress socially and economically. That is worth preserving. I earnestly hope that if we examine, as it is right that we should, some of the matters of detail which have been raised in the debate, we shall keep our eye on the main essential of our Government with the nexus between the Executive and the Legislature, the position of the Cabinet in Parliament, and the capacity that gives for strong and effective government.

6.13 p.m.

Mr. W. Benyon: I find it difficult to take up the points made by the right hon. Member for Fulham (Mr. Stewart) in what appeared to me to be a complacent look at the current situation.
I should like to add my congratulations to my right hon. Friend the Member for Taunton (Mr. du Cann) on moving this motion. It concerns one of the most important subjects we have had to debate in this house for some time. Just as Watergate brought to the attention of the American people their constitutional difficulties resulting from an overblown power of the Executive, so in our own cumbersome and slow way we are beginning to do the same thing in this country.
I agree entirely with my right hon. Friend when he says that Back Benchers can do anything if they want to, and the cry, echoing what the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) said, should be "Back Benchers of this House unite. You have nothing to lose but your chains". But, having been involved in the usual channels for three years, I am only too well aware of what those chains are.

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: Will my hon. Friend tell us how Back Benchers can vote against a negative resolution Statutory Instrument if the Government will not allocate time for it within the 28 days specified?

Mr. Benyon: I accept what my hon. Friend said. That is one of the technicalities which I hope to deal with.
We have heard about the ambitious nature of Members of Parliament, but we have heard nothing about the proper and fundamental human characteristic of loyalty. It is difficult to go against

one's friends and party, and Governments undoubtedly play on that characteristic. I make the contention that the situation will not radically change until we alter the system of election. I expect to see that in my lifetime, but probably not in my political lifetime. We therefore have to operate within the present system.
I support what my right hon. Friend the Member for Taunton said on the subject of Select Committees. The important aspect is how to relate what the Select Committees report to the proceedings of this House. I contend that the Chair should be under a Standing Order to accept a motion for a debate and a vote on a report of a Select Committee before a certain period has elapsed. I also believe that the Select Committees should be better staffed. They should shadow each Department of State, and the relevant Select Committee should be the Standing Committee when a Bill sponsored by its Department reaches Committee stage. Ministers would not be members of that Committee and the present situation would be avoided whereby Ministers are present and backed up with their expert advisers. I would prefer the Government to apear as witnesses to be questioned and to make their statements accordingly.
The crucial issue is what happens in this Chamber. Judging from my eight years' experience in this House, I believe that the power to delay, which is supposed to be the great power of the Opposition, is greatly exaggerated. I say that having sat through some of the longest Committee stages since the war. If the Government are determined to push through their legislation, they can do so. There is nothing that the Opposition can do to stop them.
Nevertheless, delay is the only power that the Opposition—and anyone else opposing the Executive—can use. However, it is a blunderbuss. It is inefficient and inaccurate. If that weapon is to be given up, there must a quid pro quo on the other side. There must be a balanced curtailment of the Government's power to push legislation through. I do not talk in this respect of the second Chamber.
My solution is that there should be—this has been discussed fully by the Procedure Committee—a timetable for each Bill. That would normally be decided by consultation through the


usual channels. If it were impossible to get agreement in that way, the matter would be put before a Committee selected on a "federal" basis. In other words, there would be one member on it for each party in the House with more than 10 members. The Committee would be chaired by a senior Member of the House. I would be prepared to involve the Chair in such an arrangement, but I am told that it is not a function that the Chair would readily undertake. I understand that, and therefore such a Committee is the only alternative.
On the other side, in order to produce a balance, the dates of the Session—I would go so far as to say the dates of the Parliament—and the daily hours should be entrenched in a Standing Order which could not be overturned without a vote of, say two-thirds of those voting The advantage of such an entrenchment would be that a Government such as the 1945 Labour Government, which had an immense majority, would be able to act just as it could with the existing system. But the arrangement would cater for the times when there was a Parliament such as we now have in which the parties were evenly balanced. The entrenchment of the 10 o'clock rule, the dates of the Session and the dates of the recess on the one side, and the entrenchment of decisions of the Committee would would determine the timetable on the other would provide a balance. Unless we have a major change such as that we stand no chance of securing our objective.
My hon. Friend the Member for Tiverton (Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop) mentioned a technical point. That is not the main issue. The main issue is the pressure which those who wish to oppose the Government can exert in this Chamber.

6.18 p.m.

Mr. John Lee: It is a tribute to the usefulness of this debate that it has provoked a number of interesting and useful suggestions from a wide range of hon. Members.
I agree with a good deal of the speech of the hon. Member for Buckingham (Mr. Benvon). I shall confine myself to taking up one issue that he raised. It arises out of the question of timetables and the guillotine procedure. No end of cant is

talked in this House about the guillotine. Every Government have introduced it. Every time it is introduced it provokes a great deal of indignation, much of it synthetic, and all of it almost invariably exaggerated. I must bear part of the blame in that respect because I have voted for most of the guillotines introduced in this Parliament, but until the Government lost their majority there was a tendency for too many guillotines to be introduced.
I do not know how much longer this Parliament will last, but I have made a vow of self-denial that I do not propose to vote for any guillotines which may be forthcoming in the rest of this Parliament. Though everyone may be talking in terms of an October General Election, this Parliament could continue until October next year. Bearing in mind that the House of Lords is in the process of savaging the Scotland Bill—for which I feel less than wild enthusiasm and to which I have not felt so passionately opposed as other matters such as the European Assembly Elections Bill—it may be that my pledge will be of some significance.
My hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Bow (Mr. Mikardo) referred in caustic terms to the closure procedure and the fact that substantive amendments can be passed and legislation drastically amended but a discussion cannot be brought to an end unless 100 Members are present.
I propose that a corresponding situation should prevail, namely, that a Government should not be able to impose a guillotine unless so many days have already passed or, say, a two-thirds majority of the House have voted in favour of it. My figure is obviously arbitrary and a smaller figure might suffice. But we must try to restrain Governments from introducing measures of a major constitutional character. We have had four such measures this Parliament—that curious omnibus Scotland and Wales Bill, which was abandoned because of the situation of the parties in the House, the Scotland Bill, the Wales Bill, and the European Assembly Elections Bill. Each of them has been the subject of an attempted guillotine. The first measure fell by the wayside because the Government were not successful in securing the guillotine. The other measures have been guillotined.
I said to my right hon. Friend that arising from the European Assembly Elections Bill—on which I could not possibly claim to be in any way objective, I admit—the Government would rue the day when they resorted to a guillotine on a measure of such magnitude and constitutional significance, because by so doing they gave carte blanche to a future Government to behave in precisely the same way if and when a similar measure, on which my right hon. and hon. Friends feel very differently, is brought forward by a future Government of a different political complexion. It may not happen next time, but I suppose that there will come a time when, by some misfortune or by the will of the electorate, the Labour Party will be in opposition. The precedent of the European Assembly Elections Bill will then be quoted back at the Labour Party and we shall not be left with any moral capital in reserve on which to energise our indignation.

Mr. Neil Marten: As the official Opposition took the most extraordinary step of voting for the guillotine on the European Assembly Elections Bill, does the hon. Gentleman think that they, too, when they are in Government, will rue the day?

Mr. Lee: The hon. Member and I feel very strongly about, and are wholly ad idem about, that piece of legislation. It was a very discreditable episode for Parliament. As we know, it was done because both major parties were determined to railroad the measure through.
I quote a former Member of this House—Tom Iremonger—who has never been very popular with Labour Members and who is certainly no longer very popular with Tory Members. He said, as a result of recent events in Ilford, North, that it is the duty of Members of Parliament to get in the way of the Government.
Without in any sense accepting the argument advanced by the hon. Member for Hastings (Mr. Warren), who would reduce the amount of legislation for reasons that my right hon. Friend the Member for Fulham (Mr. Stewart) advanced, there is more than a grain of truth in what Tom Iremonger said. The more that the Government are able to circumscribe this passion for their convenience, the more that power is eroded. There must always be an element of

balance—I concede that. But the guillotine procedure needs to be revised. It has fallen into discredit and it would be a major step forward if we could have a little objectivity from both sides, with an eye to the future.

6.25 p.m.

Mr. Angus Maude: Every hon. Member who has spoken has congratulated by right hon. Friend the Member for Taunton (Mr. du Cann) and thanked him for giving us the opportunity to have this debate. Most of us feel that it is the greatest pity that it could not have gone on for longer and thus attracted not only more speakers but perhaps a fuller House to listen to it. In comparison with some of the subjects we are compelled to discuss, this is a subject which deserves much more attention than it has received. Even so, in the course of a very short debate a great deal of very interesting ground has been covered and obviously I cannot cover all of it in a quarter of an hour.
I felt a great deal of sympathy with my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings (Mr. Warren), who said that there was always a tendency for us to bewail our institutions when the state of the country did not seem all it might be and to believe that a reform of the institutions would instantly remedy it. Over the years I have sat for many sessions on the Select Committee on Procedure and I have listened to recipes from efficient young men for streamlining—so they call it—or improving the procedures of the House of Commons. One found on analysing those recipes that every one of them would have resulted either in reducing the rights of Back Benchers still further or of strengthening the powers of the Government to get their business through quickly.
I am not sure whether even the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) recognised the extent to which some of the proposals that he made would strengthen the powers of the Executive. I cannot imagine anything more likely to increase the powers of patronage and the powers of the party machine than full-time Members of Parliament.
An elected Cabinet was one of the things of which the hon. Member was in favour. The right hon. Member for Fulham (Mr. Stewart) dealt with this at


some length. I suggest also to the hon. Member for Bolsover that no Prime Minister is or has ever been completely free to choose the Cabinet that he wants irrespective of his party and a number of other factors as well. He has to get a regional balance. He has to get a balance between various factions in his party. He is very considerably circumscribed as to whom he can choose and with whom he can replace a resigned or retired member.
A number of the other proposals which have been made today seem to me to be somewhat beside the point. My hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Mr. Benyon), who was followed in the debate by the hon. Member for Birmingham, Handsworth (Mr. Lee), talked about the guillotine procedure and timetable motions. I agree very much with most of what the hon. Member for Handsworth said, but my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham proposed that there should be a timetable motion for every item of legislation. I can see an argument for this. It is an interesting proposal and I hope that the Select Committee on Procedure, when it reports, will deal with the arguments for and against at some length, because I should like to study them.
I am pretty certain that the other proposals that my hon. Friend made, such as entrenched hours of debate and entrenched dates of recesses, would make no impression on our problem. We are talking not about procedures for streamlining the business of the House of Commons but about how Parliament can control the Executive.
Once upon a time Parliament controlled the Executive by getting rid of it for a short time. The Executive was the Crown. Parliament got rid of it but had in the end to restore it. What Parliament did in its relations with the Crown was for the most part not to try to destroy the Crown but to evolve a system of checks and balances which would cause the Crown to operate within certain reasonable limits which guaranteed the freedoms of ordinary people. The trouble is that we have not found a satisfactory alternative procedure and adequate checks and balances.
There have been two changes which have made the situation wholly different

from what it was in the last century. The first is the enormous increase in legislation, because the State has taken an interest in and control over a much wider range of the activities of industries of individuals and so on. One can have a philosophical argument about that, but the fact is that it has happened. To some extent, no doubt, it could be reversed, but we have to find a method of dealing with it.
Secondly, our situation is in a sense dependent on the other kind of parliamentary control over the Executive, namely, the control of finance, and it is this with which we have to deal and with which, I think, my right hon. Friend the Member for Taunton was most concerned. This was a comparatively easy matter in the days when all the Government did was to convince the House of Commons that they needed to spend a certain amount of money on defence, on police, on drainage or whatever it might be and then, no doubt after some argument in the House, fix the amount of revenue which they needed to raise in taxes to meet those requirements.
The enormous change which has come about is that since the Second World War the Budget has become a tool of macroeconomic policy on which the level of employment, the money supply and everything depend, and the House has not evolved a system even for understanding the implications of that, let alone for controlling it, and out of that, of course, arises quite a deal of the volume of legislation which all Governments undertake.
It seems to me that we ought to be turning our attention to that. How can we bring Parliament back into the business of controlling the immense amount of public expenditure and of understanding the secondary effects of the public expenditure which is made?
I do not pretend to know the answers—many far better brains than mine have grappled with the problem—but I think that we should at least be making a start if we could devise a system of checking over past expenditure and seeing that mistakes made in the past were not made in the future.
In the Eleventh Report of the Expenditure Committee, and in Mr. Leslie Chapman's book, "Your Disobedient


Servant", there are a number of proposals for ways by which the Exchequer and Audit Department and the Public Accounts Committee could be improved, be made more effective and be given greater powers and greater information. I believe that all are worthy of serious consideration, and I hope that the Procedure Committee will consider these matters as well.
However, I do not think that that will deal with all the questions which trouble us. I do not believe that the setting up of a Select Committee for every Department will really be a satisfactory answer. Indeed, I have quite serious reservations about going as far as that, and also about the whole question of pre-legislation Committees.
It seemed to me that the hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Bow (Mr. Mikardo), for example, who based his argument largely on the United States system, overlooked, first, the obvious fact that American Ministers are not Members of either the House of Congress, and secondly, the fact that the Congressional system of Committees gives the only opportunity which Members of either the Senate or the House have to question Ministers about their policies and about their actions.
Those are the only ways open to Members in America, but the same does not apply here. Not only do we have Question Time, but if a Minister wishes to make a statement of policy or a statement on certain actions which he intends to take, he will make that statement in the House and then be questioned at some length—generally for half an hour or 40 minutes—on the details of his statement.
It is true that Members of Parliament are not either adequately informed beforehand of the contents of the statement or adequately briefed in order to question him in depth as, for various reasons, the members of the House Committees and Senate Committees in America are.

Mr. Mike Thomas: Mr. Mike Thomasrose—

Mr. Maude: It will come out of the Lord President's time, but I shall give way to the hon. Gentleman if it is urgent.

Mr. Mike Thomas: I am obliged to the hon. Gentleman, and I intervene with apologies to my right hon. Friend. In

the Congressional Committee system and the Select Committee system, is it not the procedure whereby a series of questions can come from one Member pursuing the argument, never letting the Minister off the hook, which is important, as opposed to the gladiatorial one-off questioning which we have in the Chamber?

Mr. Mikardo: Absolutely.

Mr. Maude: I am not sure, and equally I am not sure that some hon. Members have taken account of the fact which the right hon. Member for Fulham pointed out, namely, the extent to which policy is changed by Members of the House outside the Chamber and, indeed, outside Committees altogether. The right hon. Gentleman was perfectly right to say that there have been occasions when Governments have been made to change their mind. Indeed, there have been occasions when Governments have been made to change their mind before they even got Bills published by pressure within their own parties in Committee Rooms upstairs. I have myself had something to do with one or two operations of that kind.
There is, I think, a tendency to believe that the role of the Back-Bench Member of Parliament in controlling the Executive is much less than in fact it is. Many of the proposed solutions to the problem are for this reason, I think, beside the point.
For example, there is the question of EEC regulations and legislation which my right hon. Friend and others have raised. I have never taken the view that in the last resort the House has surrendered any substantial measure of sovereignty to the EEC or to any part of it. I am well aware that a certain amount of Commission secondary legislation is inadequately discussed here, and that is a problem which we must solve, and solve before long. But I do not consider that, so long as the power of veto remains in the Council of Ministers, any Minister of any Government in this country will in the last resort be able to exercise or not exercise a veto on an important matter unless he is pretty confident of having the support of a majority in the House behind him before he does it and after he has done it. In that respect, I believe that the House of Commons has control over the Government's actions, whether here or in Brussels.
I do not wish to take too long, and I find it difficult to cover all the points which was made in the debate, but I wish briefly to deal with one or two. The hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne. East (Mr. Thomas) said something which I thought rather over-pessimistic. He said that the Leader of the House—in this case the Lord President of the Council—has two roles which are completely incompatible, being supposed to get the Government's business through and at the same time being supposed to preserve and protect the rights of Back Benchers.
In fact, those roles are not wholly incompatible, because one of the roles of the Leader of the House—if the Lord President disagrees with this he will, I am sure, say so—is to ration his colleagues' share of legislative time. It is certainly his job to try to get as much legislation through as possible, but one of his jobs is to tell his colleagues that they cannot have legislation this Session.

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: He does not do it.

Mr. Maude: That is the job of the Leader of the House, and I shall be very surprised if every Minister has got all the legislation he wanted in this Session or will get it in the next. But the roles are not incompatible if the job is properly done. It is the job of the Leader of the House to balance Private Members' time with Government time and private Members' rights with Government time.
It is no good the House of Commons bewailing the fact that there is too much legislation and too few Back Bench rights against the Executive if it is not prepared to do anything about it. Hon. Members on both sides have the remedy in their own hands. If Parliament were determined on having less legislation, there would be less legislation. Unless the Government are prepared at some stage to take a self-denying ordinance that there shall be less legislation, or are forced into it by their Back Benchers, every available moment of time will be filled with legislation. The more contentious the legislation that one Government force through, the more certain it is that the next Government will want an equal amount of time to undo some of it.
If Back Benchers want legislation to be more carefully scrutinised, and to have less legislation, they will have to insist upon this sooner or later, and some Government will have to give way and set a precedent. We shall certainly not get proper legislation in a context in which the Scotland Bill, for example, is sent to another place with only 16 out of about 80 clauses having been scrutinised in detail by this House.
It may very well be that it is impossible, as has been said, to get complex constitutional measures through this House at all, if they are contentious, unless we insert in them the kind of saving clause about the 40 per cent. vote in the referendum which enabled certain hon. Members to square their consciences with letting the Scotland Bill go through. I do not believe that we could, by agreement in this House, get through a measure for the reform of another place.
I want to refer to something that the right hon. Member for Fulham said, because I believe it to be crucial. He said that Members of this House have far more opportunities to control the action of the Executive, if they want to, than they appear to be giving themselves credit for in the debate. The hon. Member for Bolsover has talked about the immense powers of the Prime Minister, the amount of patronage there is, and the power of the Whips and of the party machine. Some hon. Members seem to be saying "Everybody else is subject to the power of patronage, the threat of the Whips and the power of the party machine, but I am Simon Pure and I only wish that the powers could be removed."
If hon. Members felt strongly enough about the need to control and scrutinise the actions and the finances of the Executive, of course they could do something about it. Are we really so pathetic that we are at the mercy of the patronage machine, the party machine and the power of the Whips? We know perfectly well that individual Members of this House and groups of Members have done precisely what they thought was right in certain circumstances and got away with it.
By all means let us set up the machinery, for which my right hon. Friend is asking, for the proper scrutiny


of the finance and expenditure of Government, but do not let us believe that any institutions or machinery will control the power of the Executive unless private Members of this House are determined to do it in concert themselves.

6.44 p.m.

The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Michael Foot): I am sure that there can be no doubt whatsoever about the value and interest of the debate initiated by the right hon. Member for Taunton (Mr. du Cann). That has been proved by every speech that has been made and, indeed, by the attendance of many other hon. Members who doubtless would have wished to participate in the debate. I am sure that we are all very grateful both for the substance of the debate on the motion and the manner in which the right hon. Gentleman introduced it.
We are also grateful, I am sure, for the terms of the motion, because they have enabled almost the whole House to agree that the motion should be passed. I do not say that I agree with every part of it. Hon. Members have been able to choose the parts of the motion that they prefer, and that is another tribute to the right hon. Gentleman's skill. Indeed, he has presented to the House the most appetising curate's egg that I have ever seen laid before us, and it is in that sense that I welcome the motion.
The right hon. Gentleman quoted from the most excellent book by Dr. Eric Taylor. I quite agree with the right hon. Gentleman's comments about the book and about some aspects of the matter that he was quoting. He referred to a quotation from Professor Ramsay Muir, who had criticised the myth about the power of the purse and of Parliament and of the House of Commons. But, as far as I recall, those remarks by Professor Ramsay Muir must have been written in the 1930s. The book does not indicate when they were written, but I am sure that it must have been in the 1930s, because Professor Ramsay Muir had died by the 1940s. Therefore, the condemnation of the decline of the power and control of Parliament over our financial affairs has not arisen in the last few weeks, months or even years; it has been developing, if Professor Ramsay Muir is to be believed, for over 30 years.
Within that time—and particularly in the last few years—there has been a considerable strengthening in some respects of the control of some of the Committees over what the Government do. Therefore, the balance is not all in one direction. I am not denying for a moment that there are many areas in which expenditure is agreed in a form and manner which are not satisfactory. That is why I agree with parts of the motion. But the House of Commons itself has taken note of the feeling of hon. Members, and of the views of academics who have looked at these matters years ago, and sought to devise some remedies. I do not say that they are perfect, but we have moved in that direction.
I shall come shortly to the main point put by my hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Bow (Mr. Mikardo), because it ties up with the general theme of the debate, but I must say something especially on what he said about private Members' time and Private Members' Bills. Although hon. Members do not always appreciate it, a considerable amount of Parliament's time is allocated to private Members, and one question to consider is whether that time is used in the best way possible in the interests of private Members themselves.
There has sometimes been argument about the time allocated for Private Members' motions and Private Members' Bills. On the whole, I have taken the view that the more time that is given to Private Members' Bills as against motions the better. It is perhaps rather churlish to say that at the very moment when we are taking the opportunity provided by the motion to debate the whole subject, but I believe that, especially when time is so precious, it is desirable that as much time as possible should be allocated to private Members, so that their Bills may have a chance of getting through. But I cannot contest the statement that controversial measures brought up by private Members have very little chance of getting through, and that, if they are to get through, there will have to be some alteration in the general conventions which have prevailed in the House in regard to the best use of our time.
I fully agree that these matters should be considered by the Select Committee which is examining the whole of our


affairs. It has its own terms of reference and can decide what matters it will deal with. But if that Select Committee does not make recommendations on the subject which the House is prepared to accept, I give my hon. Friend the undertaking that we shall consider how we must approach the matter afresh. I certainly agree that the present use of Private Members' time is not satisfactory from the point of view of the House as a whole and from the point of view of making the best use of our time generally.
I turn to the more general question raised by the right hon. Member for Taunton and by hon. Members in the debate. Although I said that I agree with much of what the right hon. Gentleman said, I do not agree with the general doctrine that the power of the Prime Minister, the power of the Cabinet and the power of the Executive have been enormously increasing, at an almost constant pace, and that the power of Back Benchers and of the House of Commons has been diminishing throughout. Nor do I agree—certainly compared with the time when I was first elected to this House in 1945—that the power of party machines has grown stronger, more fierce and more effective.
I can remember way back in the 1950s when the liberal use of the rights of Back Benchers would have been considered extraordinary by the powers who used to run those Parliaments. My right hon. Friend the Patronage Secretary is a pale shadow of a figure compared with those who used to occupy that place in days gone by. They had me out in three months on a night after I had voted against the Tories. That was my great sin at the time. The machines worked very much more swiftly in those days.
The right hon. Member for Taunton knows very well how his own party works. Perhaps it is still operating its death rays as effectively as it used to in the past and the Opposition Benches are littered with the victims. No one can deny that altogether the power of Back Benchers against the party machines has increased, is increasing and, in my opinion, should be increased still further.
I have a fundamental difference of opinion with my hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Bow with regard to the desirability of establishing

Select Committees to monitor and operate every Government Department as a remedy for the disease. I believe that that would have a whole series of evil results. First, I think that it would make the whole process of administration far more cumbrous. Far from curtailing bureaucracy. I think that it would ensure that bureaucracy was multiplied. Moreover, it would interfere with what I believe to be the central principle.
I am not in favour of maintaining the power of this Chamber just because it can occasionally present great gladiatorial contests, even though occasionally they may be desirable and essential. I am in favour of this Chamber retaining its position as the focus of the House of Commons itself, and the democratic focus of the whole country, because of the right of the individual Member to have access to this place.
It is because of the individual Member's power to have access to this place on every conceivable occasion when he is determined enough to do so that this Parliament has far greater powers over the Executive, far greater powers to protect the individual in the country and far greater powers to protect the right of the heretic Member than is the case in pretty well any other assembly in the world. Once we injure that position by saying that some Members are specialist on this subject and must not be interfered with by people who are not specialists, once we slice up the House of Commons into a lot of so-called experts on particular themes, I believe that we shall destroy, or at any rate injure, the central importance of each Member of Parliament in his own obstreperous, eccentric and awkward way of having access to this place. That is the essential part of the House of Commons which I do not wish to see injured.
I say to my hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Bow that another reason why I am opposed to Select Committees in the manner and form which he suggested—this accords very much with what was said by my right hon. Friend the Member for Fulham (Mr. Stewart)—is that I do not believe that the United States is better governed than this country. I do not believe that their constitution is better than ours. I can understand some people thinking that it is, namely,


those who wish to see extensive, radical legislation delayed.
Every great radical, reforming President of the United States has had to have a battle with Congress. He has had to have a battle precisely with those Congress committees which have been established, not for the purpose of speeding great legislation through the procedures of Congress but rather largely to check and prevent that kind of operation.
Therefore, I believe that any idea that we can solve our problems by grafting on the procedures of the United States Senate—I do not say this in any chauvinistic spirit—would not be the right course for parties that wish to sustain the power of Parliament to act. It is precisely because the power of Parliament to act is just as important as the power of Parliament to debate that I believe in the maintenance of party institutions. I do not believe it is possible to have democracy without the maintenance of party organisations, party operations and party arguments. We should not apologise for them in any sense whatever.
In that regard I agree with what was said by Disraeli:
Above all, maintain the line of demarcation between parties, for it is only by maintaining the independence of parties that you can maintain the integrity of public men and the power and influence of Parliament itself.
That is just as true now as when he said it 100 or more years ago. I believe that the intervening history of our country has proved it to be correct.
I believe that my hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Bow would, on consideration, agree with that. The best moments that we have seen in the British Parliament during our time here were in 1945 when great legislative measures transforming the economy and social services of this country were passed. There have been other occasions when Parliament has exerted itself to prevent crimes and follies of the scale of Suez. There have been other occasions when Parliament itself has come together, with Back Benchers very often leading the Front Benchers. It has always been due to the fact that the party organisations have been sustained.
There can be no democracy without a strengthening and an enhancement of the

party organisations themselves, because they express the clash of ideas without which no democracy will function successfully. I believe that despite its deficiencies—I acknowledge that they are many—this Parliament still manages to embrace the clash of ideas in the country. I do not say that we always do it perfectly. I think that we can do it better. I believe that we can illustrate it better and encourage it better.
This country faces problems similar to those which exist in other countries. We face them as well as they do and, in some cases, better. We face them better in the interests of the individual citizen. I believe that we can face them better in the interests of the community at large. The depreciation of Parliament in the way in which we tackle these immensely difficult problems is an unwise course for Parliament to take.
I speak about the House of Commons. I do not set much store by the other place. A major reform which we must carry through is to lop it off altogether. That will assist in the process, because our major task in that sense is to restore the position of Parliament in the affections, I dare say the love, of the people of this country. We are very far from that at the moment, but I believe it can be done and I believe that this debate can help us move in that direction.

6.59 p.m.

Mr. Tim Rathbone: While many people have put forward many ideas for reforming the House of Commons, none of them can be carried through until the House of Commons again becomes representative of the people of this country. That will not be achieved without electoral reform.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,
That this House notes with concern that the degree of Parliamentary control over the Executive has diminished and is diminishing; believes the opportunities for regular supervision of the actions of the Executive by Parliament are inadequate in the modern context; is concerned with the implications for the Constitution and ultimately for the efficient operation of the democratic process in the United Kingdom; and is of the opinion that Parliament's powers of supervision and control now need to be strengthened and improved.

WINDSCALE (SPECIAL DEVELOPMENT ORDER)

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Oscar Murton): Mr. Speaker has asked me to make the following statement before the debate begins.
As the House knows, this debate lasts for three hours only. This is the third time that this subject has been debated in the House, and therefore I feel that I have every right to ask hon. Members who have spoken previously on this subject to make very brief speeches if they are called. The subject arouses interest on a considerable scale, and it will be possible to call those hon. Members who have indicated a wish to be called to speak only if there is rigid self-discipline exercised all round.

7.0 p.m.

Mr. David Steel: I beg to move,
That the Town and Country Planning (Windscale and Calder Works) Special Development Order 1978 (S.I., 1978, No. 523), dated 3rd April 1978 a copy of which was laid before this House on 3rd April, be withdrawn.
I intend to be mindful of your statement, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
This motion is in an updated form. The Prayer was signed by more than 50 hon. Members on both sides of the House earlier this year, and there is no doubt that some hon. Members who wish to take part in the debate will have more fundamentalist objections than I have to proceeding with the reprocessing plant at Windscale. Therefore, in my brief opening speech I do not propose to deal with either the financial or the technical arguments, which no doubt other hon. Members will wish to deploy and some of which were aired in the debate in March, although I have read the recent reports from the United States which cast doubt on the wisdom of proceeding on both the financial and the technical grounds.
In my view, the arguments on both sides are finely balanced and contain many uncertainties. It is because of that that I believe the burden of proof ought to lie quite firmly on the side of those who are pressing this order and who argue that we should now be taking this firm step into the plutonium economy.
In fact, I disagree entirely with the conclusion, although I agreed with many of the arguments, of this morning's leader in The Times which, rather surprisingly, concluded:
The overwhelming importance of keeping the widest range of options open in the coming world shortage of power resources amply justifies going ahead at this stage. The relative novelty of the technology is itself a reason for pressing on, since success or failure will to a great extent define those options in future. But the project is a venture into political and technological waters that are very incompletely charted, and it is important that it should be kept under genuine and fundamental review as it develops, and that today's vote should not be seen as setting it on an inflexible and irrevocable course.
My first argument is that, unhappily, in this Parliament we know that these matters too easily get set on an inflexible and irrevocable course. Perhaps I may take the mind of the House back to the discussions that we had on the Concorde project. I question seriously whether, if we knew in 1962 what we know today about the costs and the effects of the Concorde project, the House would ever have given approval for it. I have looked out the figures. In November 1962, the House was told that the project would cost us £150 million to £170 million. The latest figure, given earlier this month, was £1,137 million, not to mention the annual operating cost losses to British Airways of £8·5 million, none of which takes account of the small number of orders for the aircraft or the write-off of the capital costs.
I say that merely in passing because, if one is to take The Times argument that we should not regard this vote as irrevocable—

Mr. Michael Jopling: Mr. Michael Jopling (Westmorland)rose—

Mr. Steel: I hope that I shall not be pressed to give way, because I know that a great many right hon. and hon. Members are waiting to speak.

Mr. Jopling: Will the right hon. Member give way on that point?

Mr. Steel: Other right hon. and hon. Members can counter my argument in the debate. I promised to curtail my remarks as much as possible. We have only three hours. The hon. Member for Westmorland (Mr. Jopling) knows that usually I give way in debate, but this is


a debate of a rather special nature and I must proceed with my speech. If any hon. Member wishes to challenge my figures, he may do so later in the debate. However, I obtained the figures from the Library.

Mr. Jopling: They are wrong.

Mr. Steel: The first reason why I oppose this order is precisely that I think that it is not possible, once we are past this stage, easily for Parliament or future Governments to review it and draw back.
My second reason is that I think that public opinion is increasingly concerned about the way in which we push forward technology at the dictates of the expert without adequate thought of safeguards given by the layman. On occasion, that concern turns into outrage when matters go wrong. I give three examples. There was the accident at the Seveso plant in Italy. Afterwards, a great many articles were written about it in which people said how tragic it was and what precautions might have been taken there.
Then there was the crash landing of the Russian space satellite in Canada, which happened in an unpopulated part of Canada but which nevertheless caused concern about the release of radioactivity. Then, coming nearer home, we had the wreck of the "Amoco Cadiz". Leaving aside the effects on tourism, which are temporary and ephemeral, the destruction of a total environment in part of the world surely gives rise to considerable public concern. Increasingly, people are asking what it is that we are doing to a world of which we are simply temporary trustees. I believe that the magnitude of the decision that we are asked to take today is greater than any of the examples that I have given.
It must be said that the record of safety of our nuclear industry is excellent. In the course of my visit to the prototype fast-breeder reactor at Dounreay and when I was at Windscale, I was immensely impressed by the record of the nuclear industry, and it is right to resent implications that it is less safe and less scrupulous than other dangerous industries.
Having said that, however, we are lucky in that we have never had a major incident in our nuclear industry. No one

can guarantee, no Government can, and no hon. Member can, that there might not be some incident in the future. The fact that 10,000 people were prepared to go to Trafalgar Square peacefully on a Sunday—[Interruption.]—and 3,000 to Torness on the South-East coast of Scotland—[Interruption.]—is an indication of growing public concern. I know that the groans coming from some of the Benches indicate precisely what alarms me, which is that these people are written off as cranks or political misfits. That is a wrong attitude to what is a genuine growth of public concern about these issues. A Parliament which is arrogant and sweeps these people aside is adopting entirely the wrong attitude.
That is my second reason for suggesting we should think again about going ahead with this project.
My third reason for opposing this order is that we still—and the evidence is in the Parker Report—require further investigation into the safety and security of nuclear materials both on site and in transit and of waste storage and that the information that we have so far on all these is inadequate.
It was accepted by the Secretary of State for the Environment in his speech during our debate in March—and it was accepted by Mr. Justice Parker in his report—that there is no case for domestic reasons related to a future fast-breeder reactor programme for pressing ahead now with the Windscale reprocessing plant. Indeed, in its evidence to the inquiry, BNFL said that it could withstand a further delay of up to five years without its affecting the CFR programme.
So we should not be pushed by arguments of urgency into agreeing to this order tonight. On the safety and security questions we should pause and consider what was said by the Flowers Commission. It said:
The unquantifiable effects of the security measures that might become necessary in a plutonium economy should be a major consideration in decisions on substantial nuclear development. Security issues require wide public debate.
In the debate in March there were many criticisms of the perfunctory manner in which the security question was dealt with by the Windscale inquiry and the Parker Report.
In the Written Answer which the Secretary of State for the Environment gave earlier this month in the Government's official reaction to Mr. Justice Parker's recommendations, the right hon. Gentleman said:
The Government accept the principle that security measures at Windscale should be checked by an independent person not involved in their design or operation, and will examine how best to put the recommendation into effect (No. 1). There are, however, wider security implications which need further consideration before detailed arrangements can be worked out."—[Official Report, 8th May 1978; Vol. 949, col. 337.]
Bearing in mind the perfunctory way in which security matters have been dealt with, and considering the statement that there is still quite a lot to be worked out, there is a case for examining the matter further. I suggest, whether we proceed with the order or not, that the Government should consider the appointment of a Select Committee to consider these matters, because I accept that we are limited in the degree of public debate that we can have on them.
If I may cite a precedent, the Select Committee on Services, of which I was a member a few years ago, which deals with security in the Palace of Westminster, is a model of how a delicate matter can be dealt with by private Committee. I believe that we would all be willing to trust our colleagues to look more deeply into these questions.
It is not simply a question of holding material on site. There is also the question of the transporting of nuclear material to and from Windscale. The Parker Report recommended that the majority of the transport should continue to be by rail. No doubt that will be the case. However, there was a report earlier this year that some material was being ferried by air from Windscale to Dounreay. I do not know whether the Secretary of State can confirm that. This gives rise to some anxiety.
When I visited Dounreay I was struck by the fact that if we are to have a commercial fast-breeder reactor in the future, and if it is to be at Dounreay, which appears to be the most favourable site, there is a case for examining again the Windscale project and for arguing that purely for domestic reasons the reprocessing

should be carried out where the material is to be used. This casts doubt on whether Windscale is the right place if, in the future, for domestic reasons, we want to have a commercial fast-breeder reactor programme.
I suggest that we should have a Select Committee, whether or not we proceed with the order, to consider all the questions of security.
There is still doubt about the method and location of storage. The Flowers Report says:
We are confident that an acceptable solution will be found and we attach great importance to the search; for we are agreed that it would be irresponsible and morally wrong to commit future generations to the consequences of fission power on a massive scale unless it has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that at least one method exists for the safe isolation of these wastes for the indefinite future.
I notice the very careful words used by the Secretary of State in March when he was interrupted by the hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Blenkinsop). The Secretary of State replied on this point by saying:
The vitrification process has been subject to a great deal of research and pilot demonstration. I believe, again, that the evidence is clear that it offers a promising solution to the problem."—[Official Report, 22nd March 1978; Vol. 946, c. 1544.]
That does not strike me as being beyond reasonable doubt. We have yet to reach the stage at which we have on the necessary scale proved vitrification as a satisfactory process.
There is also the question of the location of storage. Here I am slightly critical of the Atomic Energy Authority. It has been seeking planning permission and in some cases engaging in the boring of test holes in places such as Cornwall, the Scottish borders, Northumberland, the Highlands and the Orkneys. It appears to have made a tour of Liberal constituencies for that purpose, omitting for some reason Rochdale—a much more likely candidate.
I believe that the authority has run slightly ahead of both Government decisions and public opinion and has needlessly stirred up much resentment and concern about the location of future storage, particularly when the method of storage has not yet been proved. I hope that this process will not be continued.


The public require much greater reassurance about the safe handling of all these materials, both active and waste, before we press ahead with the project.
My fourth and last reason for opposing the order is that if we go ahead with it we shall be giving an international lead in the wrong direction. Even the Parker Report, which came out in favour of the project, said in paragraph 6.2:
A nuclear bomb can be constructed with the grade of plutonium recovered by reprocessing. A country, which had in its hands such plutonium, could produce a bomb or bombs more rapidly, and with less risk of its actions being detected in time for international diplomatic pressure to be exerted, than if it had no such plutonium.
Paragraph 6.6 says:
At present the system for preventing the spread of nuclear weapons is founded on a number of agreements … and … the system of safeguards which they contain or for which they provide is essentially one of reporting and inspection. This system was acknowledged by everyone to be in need of strengthening and improvement.
The reason why we ought not to proceed with the order now is because of the international evaluation programme being conducted on the initiative of the United States. It is interesting to note that this is a bi-partisan policy in the United States which runs directly counter to what appears to be a bipartisan approach in Britain. President Ford initiated the programme in October 1976, when he said
The United States should no longer regard reprocessing of used nuclear fuel to produce plutonium as a necessary and inevitable step in the nuclear fuel cycle.
He went on to say that
the avoidance of proliferation must take precedence over economic interests.
My hon. Friend the Member for Truro (Mr. Penhaligon), when speaking in the debate in March, quoted Mr. Justice Parker's version of President Carter's updating of that initiative of April 1977 when he talked about the
indefinite deferment of commercial reprocessing and recycling of plutonium."—[Official Report, 22nd March 1978; Vol. 946, c. 1598.]
President Carter said
Increasing United States capacity to provide adequate and timely supplies of nuclear fuels to countries that needed them 'so that they will not be required or encouraged to reprocess their own materials'.
He then announced that what he was wanting was

an embargo on the export of equipment or technology that could permit uranium enrichment or chemical reprocessing.
He said that he was pursuing discussions on
a wide range of international approaches and frameworks that would permit all countries to achieve their own energy needs, while at the same time reducing the spread of the capabilities of nuclear explosive development.
When the Government refer to the INFCE they do so in strange terms. The Secretary of State for the Environment in March told the House:
We hope, however—and we shall work for it—that INFCE will recommend better safeguards with perhaps greater international participation, for sensitive nuclear plants and movements of nuclear materials."—[Official Report, 22nd March 1978; Vol. 946, c. 155.]
The Foreign Secretary said that after INFCE he hoped to convert the Carter Administration
to our view of reprocessing on non-proliferation grounds.
In that speech he argued what I thought was a completely false piece of logic when he said:
If we need to reprocess fuel irradiated in the United Kingdom on grounds of better use of our energy resources and better waste management, and there is a case to be made for that, it is only right that we should offer the use of the plant to other governments who share our view that reprocessing is a necessary part of the nuclear fuel cycle. In this way I believe that we shall reduce the need for other governments to build their own reprocessing plants. In offering our services to other governments we hope to satisfy their, and our, concern about the possible misuse of plutonium.
The emphasis must be on the word "hope". That is a non-provable assertion and I should have thought it much more likely that, if we have an international evaluation programme involving 40 nation States, and if we decide to go ahead regardless of that programme. we shall simply encourage others to follow suit.
The House has a straight choice between looking at the longer term results of a decision that we take tonight against the undoubted economic value of the Japanese and other contracts which we could acquire. I believe that the onus must lie heavily on the Government, who have brought forward the order, to persuade us that we are wrong. If they do not persuade us beyond a reasonable doubt, it will be right to vote in favour of the order being withdrawn.

7.20 p.m.

The Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Peter Shore): After the Wind-scale inquiry took place and I received the inspector's report I decided that it was essential that Parliament should debate the proposed development of the oxide fuel reprocessing plant at Wind-scale before any decision was reached. That debate, which ranged fully and freely over all the issues involved, took place on 22nd March, and although it was not my wish that any vote should take place at that stage, a Division was called and a substantial majority was recorded.
Since then, under the special procedure which I told the House I intended to follow, I have made a special development order giving planning permission for the development subject to certain conditions. The House will tonight decide by its vote whether the Windscale development will proceed. None of us has any doubt about the importance of this decision.
I shall comment on some of the remarks made by the Leader of the Liberal Party, the right hon. Member for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles (Mr. Steel) during the course of his speech but I will say at once, because I do not think that he was with us when we last debated this matter, that many of the issues on which he had, inevitably, simply to touch during a short speech were thoroughly dealt with in the House during the full day's debate.
Let me assure the right hon. Gentleman that those of us who are taking a different view have no contempt for those who have objected to the Windscale order. On the contrary, we have taken their objections with the utmost serioussness and we are trying to treat the matter with the concentration and concern which I believe it deserves. I do not think it right to argue or assert that the people of this country are being put upon by technical expertise when the one thing that has preceded the whole of this parliamentary procedure and public discussion has been the longest and most thorough investigation that has ever taken place into any project. This public discussion was held openly before a disinterested inspector. It has been the most open discussion on such a subject in any country.
None of us has any doubt about the importance of this decision. When I spoke in the debate on the report of the inquiry on 22nd March I discussed very fully the three major considerations which had weighed with me in considering the recommendations of the report. They were whether the proposed development posed any unacceptable risk to the environment or to health, whether it presented security problems which would pose a new challenge to our democratic way of life and whether it would adversely affect our policy to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
On these three immensely important issues, which I think we all agree lie at the heart of the argument on whether British Nuclear Fuels' proposals should go ahead, I said why I found the inspector's conclusions persuasive. I do not intend to recapitulate all the reasons I then advanced. I would like to recall to the House how I summed up my own approach on two of the major issues involved. Whilst fully aware of the energy and the economic case for proceeding I said then
that if I considered that reprocessing involved any significant radiological danger to the general public, to workers or to the environment, there would be no question of my giving outline planning permission for the proposals which BNFL has put forward.'
There would be no question at all. On the reprocessing of foreign fuels I said:
this raises issues that go far beyond the calculus of economic gain, and we should need to be fully satisfied that by doing so we would not be undermining our major interest in making effective the non-proliferation Treaty. If we were not so satisfied we could not, and should not, proceed."—[Official Report. 22nd March 1978; Vol. 946, c. 1541–7].
That was my stance then and now. It is against that background that I have studied the arguments put forward in the course of the March debate and the anxious and critical comments made by individuals and organisations outside the House.

Mr. John Mendelson: The Secretary of State is laying great emphasis on the assertion which he certainly made, that if he could conceivably come to the view that there were radiological dangers he would not give planning permission. Surely that is putting the question the wrong way. What the House and the country have to know is that, beyond


any reasonable doubt, he is completely convinced that there can be no such danger before he commits himself.

Mr. Shore: Nothing is beyond any possible reasonable element of doubt. What we have to do, using all the knowledge and information that we have available to us, is to come to a judgment that will not imperil the interests and health of our people. To proceed in any other way would be wholly irresponsible.
Since I am the responsible Minister I shall turn first to the whole question of radioactive waste management policy. Let me start with one point that commands universal agreement. Within the next few years, up to 20 per cent. of all our electricity will be generated by nuclear power stations. These stations, as they burn their fuel, will produce radioactive spent fuel. Clearly, we must find means for dealing with this. The choice is between storage and reprocessing. I remain of the view that reprocessing is the better way. With our Magnox stations we have been reprocessing spent fuels for the past 20 years—and no one has suggested that we should store them. We believe that our new fuels from our advanced gas-cooled reactors should similarly be reprocessed in the proposed Windscale plant.
Against this two questions have been raised. First, if we do reprocess, can we be confident of safely disposing of the resultant highly active waste, solid and liquid? The solid wastes almost certainly present the lesser problem and if research now under way is successful, we may deal with them by separating out the highly radioactive content and putting it in with the liquid wastes. For the liquid wastes two steps are required.
The first is to put them into a form suitable for permanent disposal and the second is actual disposal. On the first, we must carry through to a conclusion the extensive work—I say this especially to the right hon. Memeber for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles—which has already been done on vitrification. This process has already been carried out successfully. A demonstration plant at Harwell vitrified high-level wastes from reprocessing 10 years ago. Work is now going on into a more advanced process.
Doubts are inevitable in high technology but the doubts which have been

raised about the practicability of vitrification do not in my view match the facts and we have good reason to believe that the work will be brought to a successful conclusion.

Mr. T. H. H. Skeet: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there is an industrial plant operating in France which vitrifies high-level nuclear waste making use of borosilicate glass?

Mr. Shore: That is not the only country which has made progress in this technology.
Research into disposal by deep geological or ocean burial must take longer. But there is no reason to think that its feasibility will not have been adequately tested by the time the vitrified waste is ready for disposal. I know of no scientific opinion which basically disputes this view.
The second question is whether storage of spent fuel as opposed to reprocessing is a practicable alternative. The position can be simply put. The storage of unreprocessed spent fuel, whether in controlled water conditions or in gas and air, is surrounded by questions to which answers are certainly not now known. What is known—and this is based on the Atomic Energy Authority's study for the inquiry—is that it would be wise to assume some failures after five years' storage in water.
The strategy proposed by the objectors to reprocessing would involve some elements being in store for at least 20 years. To move from storing spent fuel elements in water to storing them in gas and/or air would again require much further study. There are too many doubts to make it reasonable to require British Nuclear Fuels Limited to jettison all its experience, perhaps greater than anyone else in the world, in favour of the alternative system. I do not consider that this constitutes "assymetrical criteria of soundness". It is simply prudence in matters of the utmost importance for the protection of man and the environment.
I realise that there are many people who may accept the case for reprocessing but are still unhappy about the routine discharges of low-level radioactivity that may result, people who are anxious whether our control limits are sufficiently stringent, particularly by comparison with those which apply in the United


States. This was the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, Central (Mr. Cook) on 22nd March and referred to by others.
In reply I have placed in the Library of the House a copy of a letter that I have sent to my hon. Friend on this subject. As the House will know, the National Radiological Protection Board has recently published an appreciation of environmental radiation protection standards, which also compares the limits of the United States and the United Kingdom. Both discuss the subject much more fully than I have time to do now, but I want to emphasise some salient points.
The first point is that both the United States approach and our own conform to the basic radiation protection standards recommended by the international Commission on Radiological Protection. Although our methods differ, in practice the end result is not materially different. Scondly, such comparisons need to have regard to major differences of circumstances in various countries. The American standards, for example, are based on the assumption that no liquid radioactive wastes will be discharged—they will presumably have to be converted to solids.
Britain, however, is not a continent but an island, and we therefore are able to discharge liquid effluents to the sea where the radioactivity so discharged, although nearly 100,000 times greater in one particular case stated by my hon. Friend than the United States discharges to the atmosphere, nevertheless results in only a small additional dose to the population. Nor should it be thought that we fail to monitor the seas. The marine pathways back to man are very closely monitored.
Finally, and this is most important, the comparison to which my hon. Friend drew attention is based on BNFL's proposals. These proposals will be subject to the most rigorous scrutiny by my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and myself with a view to reducing them as far as is reasonably practicable.

Mr. Eric Moonman: My right hon. Friend's last remarks will probably cause concern among some of us. Will he enlarge on that point? Will he

accept that at present Windscale is leaking? It does not require any further establishment to prove that.

Mr. Shore: The occasional leaks that occur, and other incidents in our nuclear establishments are made public as soon as they occur under the policies pursued by my right hon. Friends and myself. However, they have not been of a character or of a scale to cause the sort of apprehensions that I think are at present in my hon. Friend's mind.
Much has been heard about the distinction between what is medically safe and what is publicly and politically acceptable. This last is a matter for our decision, and we shall have that consideration fully in mind when the time comes to frame the discharge authorisations, which have to be separately issued under the Radioactive Substances Protection Act.
During the last debate the House stressed, and rightly in my view, the importance of the recommendations in chapter 17 of the inspector's report. And I was asked to indicate the Government's response to them before this debate. I have already announced that we have accepted 12 of the 15 recommendations outright. Together their implementation will still further tighten controls over radioactive discharges, will increase monitoring, and will strengthen safeguards. Particular interest may perhaps centre on the decision to press ahead with the development of a krypton arrestment plan for THORP, and also on the provision of whole-body monitoring facilities for local people. I believe that these are all welcome improvements in existing arrangements that will provide still further reassurance.
The three remaining recommendations are those calling for an independent check on security precautions at Windscale—there are difficulties there, as I am sure the right hon. Member for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles understands—the inclusion of an independent person or body with environmental interests in the system for advising government on the fixing of radiological protection standards, and for a single inspectorate responsible for advising on the limits to be placed on all radioactive discharges.
The Government have accepted the underlying purpose of all three recommendations. They do, however, involve


organisational changes and we have to consider how best we might achieve what the inspector had in mind. We shall be doing this as quickly as possible, and I hope that the House will accept that the Government have made a full response to hon. Members who expressed concern about all these matters during the previous debate.
The inclusion of independent advice on security precautions at Windscale and on the fixing of radiological protection standards is, of course, quite separate from the wider scientific advice that I aim to obtain on radioactive waste management policy from the radioactive waste management advisory committee recommended by the Flowers Report.
I am now happy to be able to announce the setting up of the committee. Its terms of reference will be to advise me and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland and my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Wales on major issues relating to the development and implementation of an overall policy for the management of civil radioactive wastes, including the waste management implications of nuclear policy, the design of nuclear systems, research and development, and including the environmental aspects of the handling and treatment of wastes.
We are fortunate to have as chairman of the committee Sir Denys Wilkinson, who is a Fellow of the Royal Society and Vice-Chancellor of Sussex University. I am sure that his previous background in nuclear physics—as head of that department at Oxford and chairman of the Science Research Council's nuclear physics board—will be invaluable. We are aiming to keep the committee to a reasonable size with, in addition to the chairman, a majority of nine or 10 independent members with relevant scientific knowledge and experience together with one member each from the UKAEA, the BNFL, the National Nuclear Corporation and the electricity generating industry, and some members from the nuclear industry trade unions. I shall be announcing the names of these members as soon as I can. And the House may care to be reminded that the committee will be asked to submit an annual report, which will be laid before Parliament.
As the Leader of the Liberal Party reminded us, non-proliferation is one of

the issues at the heart of the matter. The Government's position was clearly stated by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs during our previous debate on these issues. It is our objective to establish a system of international management of plutonium under which plutonium produced—for example at Windscale—would be stored there and returned to its owner only under internationally agreed safeguards and supervision designed to prevent its diversion from civil use. This must be better than leaving those countries that have nuclear power, 27 with plants in operation or under construction now, and like us needing to reprocess their spent fuel, in a position that would induce them to embark on reprocessing themselves, thus multiplying the sources of plutonium supply.
Linked with this question, as the Leader of the Liberal Party put it, was the further question: why not wait for the results of the international nuclear fuel cycle evaluation programme—INFCEP—on which President Carter took the initiative a year ago?
First, as I have already shown, we must have a reprocessing plant for our own spent fuel. Secondly, even if when INFCEP was completed and the result was a decision that precluded overseas reprocessing, it would still be possible for the company to review its position and to consider how best in terms of plant size and timing to provide capacity to deal solely with United Kingdom fuels. Finally, to assume that INFCEP will result in a decision that would preclude reprocessing of overseas fuel seems to me to rest on a misconception. As my right hon. Friend said in the last debate, these studies are primarily a clearing house for ideas and the evaluation of technical alternatives. It just is not sensible to proceed on the assumption that a ban on reprocessing agreed by all 40 countries concerned will necessarily come out of INFCEP.
Finally, I want to say a word about the whole procedure which we have adopted for deciding the issue. The 100 days of the Windscale inquiry represent an event not just of national, but of international importance. No country in the world has had a more searching and serious inquiry into major nuclear issues than


we have had during that long process of inquiry and cross-examination before Mr. Justice Parker and his two very able assessors. Of course, the inspector's finding and analysis have come under critical scrutiny and attack. Given the magnitude and complexity of the issues, it would indeed have been amazing if they had not. But I must reject the suggestion made by only a few opponents that the inquiry itself was a charade. I do not accept—nor do I believe will the House—that either he or his distinguished assessors discharged their duties other than honourably or faithfully.
The Government and, I believe, this House and the country at large accept that the process of public inquiry is an essential element in the public debate on major questions of nuclear development. Further, we have established that the House itself must play a decisive role. As the House knows, the Government have declared their intention of devising a special procedure for use on future occasions when proposals for nuclear development are put forward. I believe that the procedure that we followed, or something comparable, is the only rational way to deal with these questions. But if we can devise a better procedure, we shall.
I ask the House to reject the motion to withdraw the Windscale special development order.

7.43 p.m.

Mr. Michael Heseltine: You have asked, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that we be brief. I very much take the point made by the Secretary of State that we have already had a wide-ranging debate at which many hon. Members who are in their places today were present on 22nd March and that many of the issues were ventilated extremely widely and fully on that occasion.
I understand the case pleaded by the leader of the Liberal Party that we should have more time and take another look at many of the questions that he put forward. But the fact is that there is no decision which has to be taken to which that kind of approach cannot be adopted. One can always argue that there should be more delay. No matter how detailed the investigation, the inquiry or the report which precedes the point at which we are to take the decision,

there will always be those who are against the decision that they think we are about to take, who argue that we should have yet further delay or who call in aid some future event which we should await before reaching our decision.
I think that the House should approve the Windscale special development order. In doing so, we should remember what we are doing. We are not, as the leader of the Liberal Party suggested, taking an irrevocable decision to move into the plutonium age. We are taking a decision to give planning permission for certain consequences to flow.
The consequence that flows immediately is work on the storage ponds associated with the Windscale project, and there is no risk associated with the development of the storage ponds. It would only be if we moved into the full-scale work that follows from THORP that the kind of contingencies about which the House is rightly concerned would have to be anticipated. It is not conceivable that that kind of step would be taken for perhaps another four or five years at the earliest. Therefore, I believe that the House should ask questions about the way in which it is to be kept informed of the developments that will take place between the passage of the order tonight, if that is the will of the House, and the irreversible decision which the Leader of the Liberal Party assumed would be taken tonight, but which in practice will not be taken for four or five years.
I listened to what the Leader of the Liberal Party said about Concorde. I had certain experience of the problems connected with that project, together with many other former Ministers responsible for it. The fact of the matter is that practically no high technological decision which has to be taken by modern Governments would be taken today if we argued that some of the decisions taken in the past proved more expensive than people expected. The problem with the state of the art of high technology in which virtually all modern Governments are becoming deeply immersed, is that we cannot predict exactly what it will cost or how long it will take. The fact is that, for political or economic reasons, we decide that it is right that Governments should move forward in those areas. I and, I am sure, the Secretary of State would not want to put


a price tag on the Windscale development and claim that in 10 years we shall come back to this House and say that we got the figures 100 per cent. right.

Mr. John Mendelson: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Heseltine: No. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will forgive me. We are short of time. I am sure that he will want to make his own contribution.
I was told of the reason why the Americans got their space budget so accurate. It was because, when all the experts had made their calculations, the President multiplied them by 10, and he turned out to be pretty close to the mark.
We are deciding whether to grant planning permission, a consequence of which would be that certain work could take place. The work which is of concern to the House is connected with planning and design. In consequence, it should not be put in a position where it equates with it. As a consequence of the planning and design work, I believe that we keep open certain very large commercial options which are considered to be of importance to this country.
If we were to decide not to proceed, I believe that one consequence would be that the commercial options which are open to us at the moment would diminish. We might find that by the time we wish to reconsider the matter in two years, the countries which at the moment are prepared to enter into commercial relationships with us for reprocessing would have developed their own facilities or gone to other parts of the world to seek the contracts which are conceivably on offer to us.
We are deciding the degree of probability of developing certain reprocessing facilities. The Secretary of State rightly made the point that, whatever we do, none of us can be certain that the risks are totally eliminated. Indeed, the shattering statistic produced in the House not long ago was that in the coal mining industry some 53,000 people have died in this century. That indicates the scale of difficulties which beset anyone trying to forecast what is likely to happen.
The fact is that at this time—no one can be sure that it will be so in future—the nuclear industry has a good record of safety. It is obviously of prime concern

in the decision that we take tonight to remember that and to maintain the high standards that have brought it about.
In the debate in March the Secretary of State made the point that if, as the process and the investigation continue, he is not satisfied—I shall want to ask what information the House will get about his tack of satisfaction—he has every power to refuse to allow the procedures to go on. Therefore, it is vital for the House to remember that we are not saying that from this moment on this matter moves out of the control of the politicians. It does not. It remains totally within the power of the Secretary of State of the day. Indeed, on 22nd May—column 1542 of Hansard—the Secretary of State made it absolutely clear that he had all the powers that he needed to exercise the degree of control that everybody in the House would wish to see.
I have examined the Secretary of State's reply to the Parker inquiry and I wish to ask about the number of organisations and public bodies that will be involved in the next few years. I have made a list. I do not claim that it is exhaustive but it is sufficiently long to raise a number of questions. Those organisations involved include British Nuclear Fuels, the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate, the Health and Safety Executive, the local liaison committees, the Industrial Pollution Inspectorate in Scotland, the National Radiological Protection Board, the Fisheries Radiobiological Laboratory, the Radiochemical Inspectorate of the Department of the Environment and some independent person to check the security situation. There are also the Department of the Environment, the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, the Scottish Office and the Department of Energy.
All those organisations have some specific role to play in the evolution of the Windscale project. What is the degree of co-ordination of all those organisations? For example, will there be—as I suggest that there should—either an annual statement to Parliament or perhaps a statement in two years' time on the progress that is being made in all the spheres for which these organisations are responsible? If there were we should not have to wait for one report after another nor have to try to piece them all together. It should be the responsibility


of the Secretary of State to see that there is co-ordination of all the monitoring, checking and processing of information for which those bodies are responsible to the House.
With the best will in the world and without wishing to indulge in the scare-mongering techniques which are so easy—the Friends of the Earth could not conceivably be accused of that—it is necessary for the wide number of bodies to be drawn together so that a co-ordinated view of their findings can be put before us.
Can the Secretary of State explain which hurdles he thinks that this project will now have to jump before the final decisions are taken in four or five years' time? The leader of the Liberal Party asked for a general review. This is not the time for that because we have reviewed the relevant issues thoroughly in what the Secretary of State rightly described as one of the most far-ranging public processes that any country has devised.
But there is a case for a review before a final decision is taken. It would be helpful if the Secretary of State explained exactly what that will be and the way in which Parliament will be involved in that process. I hope that during that review we shall hear about the quest for alternative sources of energy, which must be an important factor in the decisions that we have to take. But I take the view that we shall come to the conclusion that nuclear power has a significant role to play in our industrial future.
I praise the Secretary of State for his determined attempt to meet the conditions laid down by the Parker inquiry. In his written reply to the hon. Member for Derby, South (Mr. Johnson) he dealt with all the points raised. He has tried to find answers which indicate a great concern for the issues involved and do not lapse behind the phraseology of further reviews and more reports, which is an easy method of trying to escape from taking decisions.
The leader of the Liberal Party raised the question of security. The Parker inquiry recommended an independent person. It has also been suggested that there should be a Select Committee to deal with the House's anxiety about security.

I thought about this in the earlier debate and again today. I see no way in which this House can become involved directly in the security provisions at Windscale. I do not believe that it will be possible to divorce the security of the nation from the considerations and techniques that will apply at Windscale. I am convinced that one cannot meaningfully have a process whereby a Select Committee—however well-meaning its members—probes and checks security. Argument on the Floor of the House is not necessary to make the majority of hon. Members understand the vulnerability of a technique of that kind.
The leader of the Liberal Party is naive to believe that one can expose the nation's security to semi-public inquiry. Ministers of the Crown do not all have access to the security provisions of the nation. Only a small number of members of the Government have that in any Government. It would be wrong to extend it to the 80 members of the Government and impracticable to extend it to a Select Committee. I understand the need for independent scrutiny but in practice it would be difficult to go as far as has been suggested.
The Secretary of State in his announcement dealt with the question of the independent commitment of environmentally minded people to the surveillance of radiation standards. It is not always possible to pick up the full details of an announcement, but I understand that the Secretary of State is to appoint to the advisory body representatives from all the main energy institutions and that there will be a majority of non-experts from outside. That is a satisfactory outcome and I am glad that the Secretary of State has made that decision.
Any reasonable forecasts of energy requirements must assume a nuclear capability for this country. If we are to take a decision to move along that road, decisions will have to be made about the disposal of waste material, even if we pursue a nuclear commitment only for our own energy requirements. The moment that we take a decision of that sort, which was taken many years ago, we are faced with the choice of either storing or reprocessing waste. I accept the view of the Parker inquiry and of the Secretary of State that it is unlikely that one can conceive for all time that we


should want to go for storage. Reprocessing seems to be a safer and more efficient method of coping with the problems. It is right to move towards that decision as quickly as safety conditions allow.
I ask the Secretary of State to consider my argument seriously. We should recognise that we are not taking an irreversible decision tonight. The Secretary of State should come forward with an argument that will satisfy the House and those who have legitimate doubts that there will be a final moment at which the House has another opportunity to look at the whole matter. He should take into account not only the promises and the optimism upon which British Nuclear Fuels' submission is made but the facts and what has happened in the three or four years that separate us from that irreversible decision.

7.59 p.m.

Mr. Frank Tomney: The hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) has dealt adequately with the suggestion that a Select Committee should be appointed. I proposed to deal with that issue. The hon. Member dealt with it in a manner which absolves me from any future or present responsibility for such a crazy idea.
The moral indignation that the Liberal Party has tacked upon this is another indication of how bankrupt it is in real politics. The right hon. Member for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles (Mr. Steel) started with an analogy about proceeding on uncharted seas. The very act of proceeding on them is to chart them. That is what all this is about. The Secretary of State made that admirably clear tonight.
This matter is 95 per cent. conclusive, at least, but with a shadow of doubt. The shadow of doubt regarding this process and this industry is on everyone's mind. However, it does not stick that one should remain impassive and should not progress.
By the end of this century, Britain, in particular, will need as much nuclear power as it can generate and as much capital export-related industry as it can derive from the nuclear power industry, unless we want to keep men permanently in the coal mines of Britain for centuries to come, which is not a nice prospect.
The development of this project, with all the safeguards—it has had wide public debate in both Flowers and Parker—is an indication that Britain will have to find new industries as quickly as it can, industries of varying character, to maintain even our third or fourth place in capital export-related industries in the world. From the point of view of industrial history and responsibility, no country is better placed than Great Britain to carry out this project of reprocessing and storage.
My union, which has many members employed in this industry, was one of the principal movers in finding out the dangers and consequences of asbestosis. We pushed the matter through the TUC and our union journalists with the utmost vigour. These types of people and scientists are prepared to make the decisions upon which we have to depend for the future jobs and prosperity of our country. There is now an acceptance of a figure of 1½ million unemployed, which even a few years ago would have raised hell. Now apparently it is an accepted fact. But it will not stop there.
I have recently been to America to look at the American aerospace industry. When one sees the power, the enormous capital involved, the techniques, the old technology of their moon shot and new technologies that it will throw up and what they involve, one can say conclusively that in terms of material reward expensive moon aerospace projects show a net deficit on the United States Exchequer. However, in this case, the United States does not object technically and scientifically to what Great Britain is trying to do in regard to reprocessing. The Americans are scared that other nations having processed material will be able to manufacture the H-bomb.
We remember the saga. I remember the H-bomb marches. Suddenly, either Pontecorvo or Klaus Fuchs, people such as they, put it at the disposal of the Russians, and we lost sight of the marches overnight. The same agitations are taking place about the neutron bomb. If some American scientist defects or becomes a traitor and that gets into Russian hands, that subject, too, will be dropped overnight. However, it is similar people who are advancing exactly the same arguments about this scheme.
This is an industrial process wedded to a future technology. We would be foolish to deny ourselves any time by not going ahead with it, for whatever reason. After reading all the reports and having been employed in a companion industry for years, I believe that the people undertaking this project are of the highest quality and greatest responsibility.
There are times when one has to trust to judgment. If we cannot trust the judgment of these people with a full democratic system of Government inquiry, which spared no one, was exhaustive and came to conclusions, we are on the point of stagnating industrially.
We shall just have to go into other techniques and processes and probably wider fields of technology not yet known if Britain is to fight its way through. We must project ourselves 20 or 30 years ahead, and if we cannot do that we ought not to be here, because that is what all this is about. It is about men having the courage to think the matter out scientifically and technically. It is about politicians having the courage to take the decisions.
The Government and the Secretary of State for the Environment have obviously taken this decision. It is the right decision. There is no time to be lost. There are quite big export markets to be won. There is new and large technology to be developed. There is a whole new scientific world to be opened up. We cannot afford to deny ourselves this opportunity.
The hon. Member for Henley mentioned President Kennedy and the moon shot and that the factor could be multiplied by 10. That is nearly right. The scientists who presented Kennedy with a total bill for the moon landing themselves multiplied it by 10 in the hope that Kennedy would back down. However, Kennedy took one look at the figures and said "Get on with it. We shall find the money." Look at what has resulted. [HON. MEMBERS: "What?"] I shall say what has resulted. A completely new technology has resulted.

Mr. Nigel Forman: The non-stick frying pan.

Mr. Tomney: I do not know about non-stick frying pans, but that is a nonstick joke. A new technology has opened

up. The way in which we shall progress is by having the courage to do these things. The Rip Van Winkles scattered around these Benches should be paid no regard. They have been asleep for years. Let them remain that way. Then we shall all be happier and we shall progress faster.

Ms Maureen Colquhoun: What families are on the moon?

Mr. Tomney: Perhaps we shall send my hon. Friend there.
We come to a decision tonight. I hope that the House will back the Minister.

8.7 p.m.

Mrs. Elaine Kellett-Bowman: I am very glad at having been called to speak in this debate because the subject is of substantial interest in my constituency, which adjoins a nuclear plant and is very close to Windscale.
Getting information from the Secretary of State for the Environment about the Government's attitude to the Parker safety recommendations up to the eleventh and three quarter hour made getting blood out of a stone seem by comparison a relatively simple matter.
Six weeks ago, on 5th April, my hon. Friends the Members for Westmorland (Mr. Jopling) and Morecambe and Lonsdale (Mr. Hall-Davis) and others, and myself, put down Early-Day Motion No. 354 asking the Government to make a statement—I repeat, a statement—on the Government's intentions with regard to the safety recommendations contained in the Parker Report in sufficient time for us to consider them before debating this order, as we are doing now. Every week since then we have pressed the Leader of the House to ensure that such a statement was made. What did we get? We got a miserable Written Answer last week, on which the Minister could not be questioned.
Much of the information that the Secretary of State has given us this evening could have been given to us then, had it been in the form of a statement on which we could question him. My hon. Friend the Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) had to pin the Secretary of State down on various points which were by no means clear due to the speed at which the right hon. Gentleman read his speech. All these


could have been given to us clearly in time for us to have digested them thoroughly last week.
I also find it completely unacceptable that the Government failed to find time to debate this order until the days for praying against it had expired, as they did on Friday 12th May. I accept that the Secretary of State will take the decision of the House, but it seems a very odd way of arranging the business of the House. When the Government wish to find time for debating some nefarious schemes that they fancy, they can always find the time. They should have done so in this matter, which is a legitimate cause of concern to many people.
I regard the Parker Report as a thorough and painstaking document—hardly light bedtime reading, but, as the Secretary of State said, the most thorough report which has ever been known anywhere in the world, and one which, provided that all its recommendations are carried fully into effect, as the right hon. Gentleman has today promised they will be, will still the fears of all but the most ardent anti-nuclear lobbyists. There are one or two tiny points which still need to be cleared up, but I shall come to those later.
Far and away the greatest danger that we could face would be an accumulation of unprocessed spent fuel stored in a variety of ways, none of which is yet wholly satisfactory. If, on the other hand, we go ahead with this processing plant now, we shall avoid both that accumulation and the danger of being forced into a crash programme later.
The leader of the Liberal Party wondered why people were drilling holes, mainly in Liberal constituencies. The simple answer is that the EEC has embarked on an extensive nuclear safety research programme on radioactive waste and storage and each of its members was given a certain geological formation to explore. The United Kingdom was given granite. Since the Liberals have been driven into the granite fastnesses where alone they can survive, that explains why the holes are in their constituencies.
Since spent fuel passes through my constituency, I am particularly interested in the safety of fuel in transit. Fears have been expressed on two scores: the danger of terrorist attack, and the danger of an

accident causing a leak. Fuel going to Windscale is transported in heavy loads, of 60 to 100 tons, under stringent supervision and in massive flasks. I understand that those containers have been tested under the most severe conditions, including dropping them from aircraft 2,000 feet on to concrete, to make certain that even if an accident occurred, there would be no leak. I should appreciate an assurance from the Minister that that is so.
The right hon. Gentleman has told us that strict safety regulations for flasks and vehicles, governing design and construction, labelling and the protection of operators and the public, are laid down by the Secretary of State for Transport, but I should like more information on the stringency of the tests used.
On its return, the reprocessed fuel would be transported after being diluted with uranium and would never be sent neat, so any terrorist would have to dismantle the fuel element and treat the plutonium before he could even begin to make a bomb. I understand that it is also possible to pre-irradiate it or leave fission products in the reprocessed fuel, which would make matters even more complicated and dangerous for any would-be terrorist. I believe that eventually, all plutonium should be stored under international control and returned to its country of origin only when the need is clearly demonstrated.
No country would go to the lengths of building a fast-breeder reactor merely to get its hands on plutonium for warlike purposes, if only for the perfectly simple reason that it would be cheaper for it to make a small-scale reprocessing plant of its own. Indeed, unless there is some system among the more advanced nuclear Powers for reprocessing fuel for smaller countries and returning it to them as required, there is a grave danger that many small reprocessing plants will be established at all sorts of places including relatively under-developed countries, which would be infinitely more vulnerable to terrorist attack than one well-guarded installation such as that proposed at Windscale.
Although all the recommendations of the Parker Report are important, those to which I attach particular weight are Nos. 1, 5, 11 and 15. It is vital that some independent person or body should have the


continuing task of vetting security precautions at all stages, both in transit to and from the plant and at the plant itself, and also for reviewing the adequacy of such precautions regularly. There should be some wholly independent body to advise the Government on the security standards and the members of that body should be changed from time to time to prevent complacency.
The right hon. Gentleman's Written Answer to this recommendation was less than satisfactory, and he did not entirely clear up the matter today. Possibly we shall have more elucidation later. However, what he said today was a vast improvement on what he said in that reply. I had worried until then, but now I am considerably reassured. Only minor matters are still niggling at the back of my mind.
The same applies to recommendation No. 5, on the inclusion of a wholly independent body or person to advise the Government. Again, the Written Answer merely said that the review from the Radiological Protection Board
would be extended to cover that recommendation as well,
but gave no further information. The further information that the right hon. Gentleman gave today was helpful, particularly the fact elicited by my hon. Friend the Member for Henley that a majority of the non-experts would be from outside the power industries. Had that information been given in a statement last week, these points would have been cleared up earlier and rather more clearly than could be done in an opening ministerial speech.
By comparison with the Government's evasive treatment, until a late hour, of some of the recommendations, the response of British Nuclear Fuels has been prompt and efficient. The company accepts the need for recommendation No. 11, that safety precautions and operating procedures at Windscale should be sufficient for all eventualities and for the strict observance and frequent rehearsal of safety precautions and operating procedures. It has given a firm commitment to keep them constantly under review and to institute whatever improvements may prove necessary. Of course, all the safety regulations are subject to approval and

surveillance by the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate.
The company has also agreed to design the oxide reprocessing plant so that a krypton removal plant can be incorporated in it and to pursue the necessary research and development to this end. It has also agreed to install a third whole body scanner for monitoring employees and will be able to offer a full monitoring service to the general public well before THORP comes into operation.
Bearing all this in mind, and providing that the Secretary of State can clear up the small points that I have mentioned, I am perfectly satisfied that the establishment of the reprocessing plant will not threaten public safety but in fact enhance it. Accordingly, I shall give it my support.

8.19 p.m.

Mr. Robin F. Cook: I shall be brief, because I was one of those Members fortunate enough to be called in the debate when we last discussed this matter. At the start of my speech in that debate I referred to the number of witnesses who, in the comparatively short time since the publication of his report, had stated their dissent about the way in which their evidence had been treated by Mr. Justice Parker.
In the two months since our last debate that trickle of speakers has become a veritable cascade. Many hon. Members will have seen the letter in The Times three weeks ago signed by 17 witnesses for the objectors, in which they said:
We each consider that our evidence has been either misunderstood, misrepresented, distorted or ignored.
We are all aware that people who lose at planning inquiries sometimes take umbrage at the fact. Possibly the soothing of constituents who have failed somewhere in the planning procedure is part of our normal surgery service.
I invite the House, however, to note the status of the people who signed that letter. They include Professor Peter Odell, who has since been appointed as a consultant to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Energy. One assumes that this indicates that my right hon. Friend places greater value on Professor Odell's contribution to this subject than did apparently Mr. Justice Parker. The list also includes Professor Radford. He is not only a distinguished


member of the United States National Academy of Sciences, but chairman of the committee on the biological effects of ionising radiation. So furious was Professor Radford at the treatment of his submission to Mr. Justice Parker that he visited Britain only last month and challenged Sir Edward Pochin, one of the two assessors, to public debate on the evidence.
I draw the attention of the House and particularly of my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith, North (Mr. Tomney), who is no longer here, to the name of Professor Rotblat, which is also attached to the letter. He was one of the scientists who worked on the original Manhattan Project and has since served as a consultant to Harwell and Aldermaston. I do not know whether he was one of the people whom my hon. Friend had in mind when he put all the objectors in the same boat as Klaus Fuchs, but I suspect that my hon. Friend would be very unwise to repeat such a suggestion outside the privileged confines of this House.
Professor Rotblat has written at greater length elsewhere about the way in which his evidence was treated. He is quoted only once by Mr. Justice Parker and then on a matter upon which he did not purport to give evidence and in a way which ran contrary to the evidence submitted by another witness from the same organisation. Having quoted in such a convenient fashion, Mr. Justice Parker added:
Such a view, coming from such a person, appears to me of considerable significance.
Professor Rotblat rather dryly adds that his other views
supported by a mass of evidence, do not appear to be of any significance to Mr. Parker.
Other hon. Members have made the point that it will be four or five years before this plant begins construction, and 10 years before it begins operation. I very much doubt whether the report that is before the House will stand the test of that time, given the way in which it has already been undermined in the last few months. In the meantime, we must make a decision on it, but we are asked to decide upon a report which is a collection of paradoxes.
It is suggested that uranium and plutonium in the spent fuel are too valuable to throw away. Yet Mr. Justice Parker,

elsewhere in the report, says that as a production plant THORP is very unattractive because the uranium that comes out at the end will be more expensive to reprocess than it would be to buy on the open market. Any substance that costs more than its price on the market cannot be regarded as valuable.
The argument is advanced in the report that we should go through with reprocessing because it would be a useful technique in waste management. Yet reprocessing is notoriously the most messy part of the nuclear cycle which will release a stream of additional isotopes into the environment.
Let me refer here to the letter which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment sent me in reference to points I had made in our previous debate. That letter has since been deposited in the Library. My right hon. Friend will be aware that I received the letter last week, and I do not therefore wish to reply to it in detail without the opportunity to take advice.
I shall, however, make one observation about the letter and about my right hon. Friend's opening remarks to the House this evening. Is it suggested that the most significant difference between Wind-scale and the three American plants is that Windscale is situated on the coast and that because of that enormous difference and the great convenience of putting discharges into the sea we can thereby increase Windscale's discharge in one case by a factor of 100,000 and in other cases by factors of several orders of magnitude? Is it suggested that that makes such a difference? If it is, I am surprised that the Americans, with two very long coastlines, have not hit upon the simple expedient of siting one of the three reprocessing plants on one of those coastlines.
I shall try to deal with my right hon. Friend's letter in greater detail when I have had the opportunity of considering it further.
Let me move on to the third and greatest paradox in the Parker Report, a paradox that was advanced from the Dispatch Box with superb elegance in both the debates. It is that by building a plant to separate plutonium and by building it on such a scale that we can take orders from other parts of the world,


particularly an order of enormous magnitude from Japan, and ship that plutonium round the world, somehow we are reducing the chances of proliferation rather than giving them additional impetus.
Let me refer to the speech by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs when he addressed the House at the end of our last debate. He put considerable emphasis on the fact that we were not prepared to export reprocessing plants. He said:
We have never made such a sale, nor do we intend to do so."—[Official Report, 22nd March 1978 Vol. 946, c. 1667.]
But it is plainly absurd to make a point of not exporting reprocessing plants, but to have no objections to the export of plutonium itself. Our anxiety about the sale of a reprocessing plant to Brazil or Pakistan, which is presumably what the Foreign Secretary was referring to, is not that these countries will load the factory on to a jumbo jet and drop it on one of their neighbouring countries but that they would use the plant to produce plutonium which they could then drop on their neighbours. We are concerned that by this contract we shall be supplying plutonium to the Japanese in a way which, if they so wished to do that to their neighbours, they could do it more easily, cheaply and quickly than the Brazilians and Pakistanis would be able to do as a result of contracts to build reprocessing plants.
We have been told, as we shall no doubt be told again, that the Japanese have no present intention to develop nuclear weapons. That is certainly the case. We are dealing with a contract which will not come to fruition for another decade. My hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith, North suggested that if any of us could not see 20 or 30 years ahead we had no right to be here. I am bound to say with greater humility than he that I would be most dubious about predicting the political position in Britain 10 years from now. I should be even more reticent about making any prediction of what Japanese politics will be like 10 years from now.
In my previous speech I referred to Press reports of a CIA memorandum on Japan's intentions for nuclear weapons. I have now obtained, for the avoidance of doubt, a copy of that memorandum.

So that the House knows what it is doing, I should like to repeat what the CIA says in quoting the intelligence elements of the United States air force and the intelligence department of its navy. Both
see a strong chance that Japan's leaders will conclude that they must have nuclear weapons if they are to achieve their national objective in the developing Asian power balance. Such a decision could come in the early 1980s.
That is, in other words, at exactly the time that we expect the plant to start coming on stream.
Hon. Members should be aware that in January this year there was some controversy in Japan because Mr. Ito, director-general of the defence agency in Japan, speculated that possibly the possession of tactical nuclear weapons would not be contrary to the Japanese constitution. Mr. Ito was very summarily made to eat his words the next week by the Japanese Government and he announced that he had not meant that at all. Quite clearly, the director-general of the defence agency in Japan no more makes policy than does the Chief of Defence Staff in the United Kingdom. Clearly, no particular view should be attached to the statements of either gentleman: both are merely musing aloud and not in any way representing Government policy. Nevertheless, we are bound to be somewhat concerned that the speculation even exists.

Mr. Tom King: Is it not the case that the Japanese already have a store of plutonium from their research reprocessing facility, and the idea that the new facility that we are offering will put something into their hands that they do not already have is not correct?

Mr. Cook: The hon. Gentleman is correct. The Japanese have a small reprocessing plant. If they wished to produce one or two clandestine weapons, they could certainly do so. However, the question to which the House must address itself is what action on our part is likely to make that path seem more tempting and to seem more approved of by the rest of the world community.
I shall seek to rub home the point by quoting the next sentence from the CIA document which I did not previously read into the record but which I think I


should in response to the hon. Gentleman's intervention. The document continues with these words:
It would likely be made"—
that is, a decision to acquire nuclear weapons—
even sooner if there is any further proliferation of nuclear weapons, or global permissiveness regarding such activity".
I cannot conceive of greater global permissiveness than precisely the type of contract we are seeking to promulgate with the Japanese which will give them a much greater store of plutonium than they could ever acquire through the reprocessing plant that they possess at present.
However, our concern about the proposal and our concern about its connection with proliferation does not depend entirely on the connection with Japan and does not turn solely on the question of whether Japan itself seeks to become a nuclear weapon State. Our concern would remain even if the proposed plant at Windscale was purely for domestic purposes. If we in Britain choose to have a reprocessing plant as an integral part of our fuel cycle, how can we object if anybody else—Brazilians or Pakistanis—chooses to go down the same path?
I was one of a number of Members of Parliament who went to visit the German embassy in London to complain about the Germans' proposed sale of a reprocessing plant to the Brazilians. One of the points that we made at the time was that all the evidence in our possession suggested that reprocessing was not a necessary part of the cycle and certainly made no economic advantage as part of the cycle. I was rather disarmed by the German diplomat who greeted us. He greeted us with great courtesy and frankness. He said that that precise point had been made to the Brazilians but that their response had been that they see a reaction in the West—the United States then attempting to build three reprocessing plants, and Britain developing Wind-scale into its own reprocessing plant, and Germany with a long-term ambition in the 1990s to open a reprocessing plant; and the Brazilians refused to believe, on seeing this activity in the West, that such activity could not be of economic advantage. If we ourselves choose that particular

fuel cycle, we cannot complain it other nations follow us.
That is why I think that President Ford and President Carter were right in seeking to call a halt until the world can achieve a different type of energy resource to a fuel cycle which depends on reprocessing.
I draw some comfort from the fact that the Foreign Secretary himself clearly has some sympathy with that view. I quote from the speech he made on 19th May 1977—nearly a year ago—when he said this:
There have been men of vision, there have been important achievements, but, judged overall politicians have allowed the urgency and dangers to be swamped by commercial interest and bureaucratic indifference. President Carter is absolutely right to give this issue high priority …
I think that the Foreign Secretary was absolutely right.
It is very unusual for leading politicians to stand up against commercial and bureaucratic pressures. That is why President Carter's stand requires recognition and support. Equally, it is precisely because when we are put to the test we look like succumbing to commercial pressures rather than standing by strategic policy which might assist in achieving a halt to global nuclear proliferation that I am deeply concerned about this contract, and that is why I shall be joining those who will be voting for the withdrawal of the order.

8.33 p.m.

Mr. Richard Page: In this very natural follow-on to the debate on 22nd March, when some hon. Members have been able to present their views, a few of them with considerable emotion, in view of the short time available and the fact that I was lucky enough to be called in the last debate on this issue, I do not intend to spend hours talking about the problems of nuclear proliferation. I believe firmly that if a nation wants to have nuclear weaponry or nuclear power it will have it in time whether or not Windscale is developed. I believe that the question of proliferation should be dealt with in a completely different debate and at a completely different time.
The point which is of importance to me is a purely local one. It is that of safety and I shall concentrate on this


point this evening. The first issue is the safety in transport of the spent and reprocessed fuel in the specially constructed containers which have been called by some "nuclear coffins". This has very naturaly caused worry to local residents. Not only has this matter been examined and dismissed as a negligible risk in the Parker Report, but I have seen some of these containers under construction. I was impressed by the qality of the engineering. I can conceive of only the most unlikely event causing any damage or accident which would split a container and thus expose the contents. An example of such an unlikely event would be a transport lorry being hit by a crashing aircraft. Even if such an unlikely event were to occur, the contents, if spilled, need—owing to their constitution at that time—cause very little concern to nearby residents.
I turn to the highly active waste which is to be stored in silos on the site and is to remain there until it has lost sufficient of its heat so that it can be vitrified into glass blocks. That surely must be an improvement on the present position, and offers a far better option to the environment than the rather uneasy alternative of long-term storage and keeping our spent fuel untreated. As the Secretary of State said on 22nd March, there are two possible ways of dealing with our fuel. We can keep it and store it for eventual disposal, or we can reprocess it and vitrify the highly active waste. If we do not authorise this vitrification process, we shall have to design and develop new facilities for long-term storage and the subsequent waste of unused uranium in the spent fuel rods, and I believe that the disposal of this highly active waste in glass blocks is safer than the establishment of long-term storage areas.
My last safety point relates to the disposal of the low grade waste into the sea and into the air. This, to me, represents the area of the greatest concern, because it concerns more of an unknown. The majority of the other aspects are really of a mechanical nature. If one is worried that a container can burst open, the thickness of the metal can be doubled. If one is worried about security, one can raise the fence a little or double the guards. But with low grade discharge we have to ascertain the effect on the environment

and just what will happen to the environment in the long term and what effect that will have on the people living in Cumbria. On that aspect I had a great deal of sympathy with BNF at the inquiry, because it was rather in the position of a motorist driving down the M1 at 30 miles per hour and being stopped by the police and asked to justify his going too fast, not his going too slowly.
The international limits for discharges via the authority of various Government bodies are given to BNF and it operates within those limits but, even so, that alone must not satisfy us, and I was very pleased to see the recommendations in the report for specific discharge limits for significant radio nucleids and the continuous monitoring of discharges into the environment, and I must underline that word continuous. As such I happily welcome the Secretary of State's acceptance of these recommendations because I know that they will bring reassurance to many people in Cumbria that a build-up of radioactivity cannot occur unnoticed.
Much play has been made of the limits and what is and what is not safe. The media have run several programmes on this aspect, and one on television started with the obligatory clip of an atomic explosion even though the Windscale operation is a chemical one and a nuclear explosion from the reprocessing plant is just not possible. Various fears about increasing cancer cases have been mentioned without any hard evidence at all being produced, and it is very pleasing to notice that, from statistics supplied to me today by the Secretary of State for Social Services, one finds that if one looks at the cases of cancer in Cumbria one finds that per 100,000 there were 252 cases per year over the past five years, whereas the national average was 246. If one goes deeper into the matter and looks at the cases of leukaemia per year one finds that in Cumbria they numbered 6·5 whereas the national average was 6·3. When one looks at these figures and evaluates them one finds that there is virtually no difference.
If one were to go still deeper into the matter and look into the make-up of the population in Cumbria, and take into account the migration of young people that has occurred out of Cumbria and the immigration into Cumbria of people


going into retirement, it would not surprise me to find that the number of cases in Cumbria was below the national average. I know that that is information which will allay the fears and misgivings of many people, especially in Cumbria, and especially of those 12 people in total who, in all the time that this inquiry and debate has been going on, have written to me expressing concern.
Much emotive language has been used both within and outside the House about the inquiry and the application. Phrases such as "nuclear dustbins" and "pimps peddling a diseased harlotry" have been used. But I firmly believe that, in the absence of alternative energy supplies—another matter which should have even more Government encouragement and support—if we do not proceed with this energy programme, at the very best our descendants will condemn us bitterly for burning valuable oil and coal for heat instead of using them as chemicals, and at the worst they will curse us as they huddle together in caves, rubbing sticks together to keep warm.
That, in turn, is emotive language, but can we imagine what our community would be like with our fossil fuels burnt and with no alternative form of energy? Until we develop a commercial alternative to the nuclear power programme, we should be very foolish to abandon our one certain source of power.
I believe that, with the recommendations on monitoring and discharges, and with the assurances given by the Secretary of State this evening and in the reply which he so kindly sent to us, the operation of this plant will in fact be a lot safer, and in my view it ought to proceed.

8.42 p.m.

Mr. Arthur Blenkinsop: We shall, I believe, make a great mistake if we give the impression that the decision of the House tonight on this Prayer is not of the first importance. It has seemed to me that too many of those who have spoken thus far have tried to give the impression that this is a matter of limited significance and that, after all is said and done, the main decisions remain to be taken later.
Technically, there is some truth in that, but in real political terms we are, I am sure, all aware that the decision we make

tonight is one which will inevitably have a great influence on a whole succession of later decisions, and it is precisely for that reason that I issue an appeal to all my colleagues in the House, to right hon. and hon. Members on both sides, to think very carefully about what they are doing.
I shall be as brief as I can, but I wish to revert to an issue which I raised earlier. Although I share the anxieties on the safety issue, on the wider issues of proliferation and, above all, on the issue of civil liberties, which is of enormous importance—I do not think that we have begun to understand the kind of society into which we may be moving—there is another issue which affects me greatly.
What reality is there in the claim that we are seeking to preserve options for different forms of energy resource in this country? I share that objective to the full, but it seems to me that in taking this step and, I believe, the almost automatic successor steps which will be taken, we are, in effect, whatever our intentions may be, denying that option for the future. This is the issue about which I am most deeply concerned.
It seems to me that we are here talking about commitments in capital, in research, in expertise and so on of an almost unimaginable scale. For the Wind-scale plant, we are, I believe, talking of sums around £600 million, but, as I say, I do not believe that that is meaningful if we do not take into account the automatic successor plants for which the figures will run into thousands of millions of pounds.
I do not believe that we can afford that kind of commitment ahead if we want to preserve the opportunity of commitment in other fields. We are just beginning to move into experimental examinations of prospects in wave power and in other areas. We welcome the announcements made about some of the modest inquiries which have so far been made in these areas. We are not yet in a position to commit large sums. The possibility of their commitment will come at just about the time when we are at our maximum commitment to nuclear development.
I believe, therefore, that those who wish to preserve in real terms the options of other forms of energy development, as


well as preserving an option in the nuclear field—I am not an automatic opponent of nuclear development—should vote for the Prayer tonight as the way of ensuring that those options are a reality.
At the Parker inquiry there was evidence from men of great eminence, and I believe that they were very badly treated. They were men who have made great contributions in this field and have great knowledge, and who have expressed their deep anxiety about the position if we go beyond a certain point in nuclear development. I think we should listen to their warnings.
In addition to the anxieties which have been made clear in the past from each side of the House on the questions of safety and of civil liberties, the issue of the reality of the option is one of the outstanding issues of which the House should be thinking tonight.

8.47 p.m.

Mr. George Thompson: The House knows that my interest in these matters stemmed originally from my concern that no repository for vitrified high-level radioactive wastes should be constructed in the hills of South-West Scotland. My interest has since radiated far and wide, but I want to concentrate on the wastes issue, because I believe, with the Flowers Report, that
There should be no commitment to a large programme of nuclear fission power until it has been demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that a method exists to ensure the safe containment of long-lived, highly radioactive waste for the indefinite future.
In my view, THORP, on the scale proposed, is one step towards just such a commitment—not a direct step, perhaps, but an indirect step all the same. I had hoped to have advice from my friend Professor Tolstoy, who gave evidence to the Parker inquiry. I wrote to him in America, and under separate cover sent him a copy of the Windscale Report. He received my letter but has not yet received the Wind-scale Report. I suppose that Colonel B must have taken some time off from court to interfere with it—or perhaps his opposite number in America did so.
However, British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. has spared no pains to plead its case. I had a letter from Mr. Bolter, the director of information services, with which he

enclosed a summary of the proposed Japanese contract. He specifically drew my attention to a section in the summary which says:
BNFL has the option to return any waste which is in a form suitable for safe transportation and storage.
Therefore, BNFL has an option, but will BNFL exercise that option in every case? Can the Minister assure us that it will be so exercised—even, if necessary, on Government instructions?
But what if one of our customers for THORP comes to the Government or to BNFL and says "Our country is subject to earthquakes. We have no stable geological formations to hold our vitrified waste. Our people, because of their history, will not accept nuclear waste at all. How about a repository for our waste somewhere near Wind-scale? We shall make it very much worth your while." I think it was the Emperor Napoleon who had a bon mot about the "nation of shopkeepers". Judging by what we are dealing with here tonight, where the rush is due to the Japanese contract, I have every reason to believe that if this sort of proposition were to be made to the Government in London they would be sorely tempted. Indeed, on present showing, they would probably take it up. In any case, it occurs to me that in the course of time, far from waiting to be lured by the offer of filthy lucre, they might well be out touting the world for trade. A firm of wine merchants has the slogan "Ali the world's wine". Is "All the world's waste" to become BNFL's slogan?
Would there be customers? Yes, of course. In an article in Science on 2nd December 1977, the professor of geology and civil engineering at the University of Kansas wrote:
Because high-level radioactive wastes will require burial in areas of low seismic activity and high structural stability, countries such as Japan, Indonesia, and Peru, and islands such as New Caledonia will have to export their wastes to other countries or seek other means of disposal.".
He wisely observes that:
Those countries with a stable geological environment may not be willing to accept for burial large amounts of nuclear waste generated in other countries.
If these possibilities are possibilities—I am almost inclined to think that they will become probabilities—the alarm bells


begin to ring in my mind. Just by chance, it surely could not be more than that, the site where proposals for test boring has gone furthest is in the South-West of Scotland. The hon. Member for Lancaster (Mrs. Kellett-Bowman) reminded us that this was an EEC project. But no one will convince me that the British Government did not have a fair idea in the negotiations about where they would want to do their bit in the project.
The periphery of the United Kingdom in the granite areas was the place. Of course, if the Scots are not prepared to be treated in this way, they have their own remedy by taking charge of their own land and resources so as to protect their own people from the dangers that I foresee. It is up to them to choose. My party gives them the chance of choosing the way of full self-government.
To sum up, in the interests of my own country, in the interests of this island, of England, Wales and Ireland—indeed, in the interests of mankind—I shall oppose the order.

8.53 p.m.

Mr. Arthur Palmer: We have had a very good debate tonight, although it is a pity that we did not have more time. However, no one can seriously suggest that in the last six months this issue has not been fully debated in the House. In fact, apart from ministerial statements, there have been no fewer than three debates on the issue.
Obviously, I am not against all this scrutiny of one potential industrial risk. But it is a pity that on occasion we cannot devote as much time to other and proved industrial risks—for instance, the risks to the environment and the way we live from oil pollution on beaches from giant tankers. That is an obvious industrial risk, unlike the one we are talking about today, which is potential and possibly nothing more.
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment made a very good speech tonight. He also made a very good speech on the previous occasion on 22nd March. I should like to quote one passage from that speech. He said:
In the 100 days of inquiry that took place last summer"—
he was referring to the Parker inquiry—
more than 4 million words of evidence were heard and every aspect of the matter

was raised and made subject to cross-examination before the inspector. The scope of the inquiry was exceptionally wide-ranging and I have heard of only one of the parties who thought that the inquiry arrangements were inadequate."—[Official Report, 22nd March 1978; Vol. 946, c. 1540.]
Experience is showing that my right hon. Friend's view on that occasion was a trifle premature. It is obvious now that the anti-nuclear forces—and I do not complain about it—have regrouped themselves and, having been defeated on the facts at the inquiry, are falling back on the timeworn device of challenging the scope and fairness of the inquiry.
I read a great deal of the anti-nuclear literature. One or two of the nuclear opponents of an anarchic turn of mind go even further. I do not, of course, include the distinguished company of dissatisfied writers in The Times. But there are some of a rather different turn of mind. They go even further in their arguments and contend that there is no such thing as objectivity, that all opinions are subjective, and that one opinion is as good as another, irrespective of the supporting evidence. That argument is being seriously used in one or two antinuclear quarters.
If that is truly the case, there was no point in having the inquiry at all, which could have been held only on the normal, rational basis of taking evidence, written and oral, cross-examining witnesses and, at the end, drawing conclusions and making recommendations to the Minister as required. I do not see that it could have been done in any other way. It was done most conscientiously by Mr. Justice Parker and, had he decided on the evidence that the development should not proceed, I suspect that Friends of the Earth and the others who now accuse him of bias would have applauded his upright judgment.
I think that the House knows that I have supported the development of nuclear energy as essential for the industrial progress of the country over many years. Had Mr. Justice Parker given the thumbs down to the Windscale expansion, I should have regretted it and regretted the loss to the country of valuable overseas processing contracts. But then I should have advised the industry, if it had been prepared to listen to me, to look again at the possibilities of the "once through" cycle and permanent pond


storage, which is difficult but not impossible. It has many technical problems. But most certainly I would not have accused the umpire in retrospect of aiming from the start to ensure a win for one case against the other.
In his inquiry, Mr. Justice Parker had three main issues to determine. The first was whether the proposed expansion of BNFL at Windscale posed an unacceptable risk to the environment and to the health and safety of the public. There is always some risk, of course, as there is with every industrial process. But was it acceptable? He concluded that it was an acceptable risk both in terms of normal radioactivity from the plant and in the event of an accident of something going wrong.
The second issue which Mr. Justice Parker was asked to determine was whether the installation when expanded would mean such security checks against, say, the theft of plutonium that it should not be tolerated in a free democratic society. Here he was up against the difficulty that to explain in detail the security measures was to lessen their effectiveness. Nevertheless, he concluded that the risk was well understood by those responsible for the plant and that the counter-measures would be on the laid-down international guidelines and supervised independently.
The third conclusion was on whether reprocessing would adversely affect our British contribution to non-proliferation in nuclear weapons. The good judge concluded in effect that it would have no negative effect but would have the positive advantage of concentrating plutonium production and reducing the need for non-nuclear States to set up their own plants. These seem to me to be three extremely rational conclusions.
Therefore, the House should give the order a passage tonight. As one connected with the trade unions in the industry, may I add that the unions are much in favour of the order going through?

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bryant Godman Irvine): May I acquaint the House of the fact that if speeches are confined to about five minutes each, I shall probably be able to accommodate all those who wish to speak?

9.1 p.m.

Mr. Geoffrey Johnson Smith: I confine my remarks to public opinion and the manner in which we in the House arrive at decisions of the kind that we are being asked to make tonight.
When the Minister announced his decision to hold a public inquiry, he was rightly and justifiably praised. It was a good exercise in open government. When the inquiry was completed that was also highly praised by all that took part in it. The report also received good commendation from both sides of the House and from the public at large. It was not highly praised, but at least it was praised.
As the hon. Member for Edinburgh, Central (Mr. Cook) rightly said, as time went by, however, the trickle of criticism developed into a flood. I concentrate my remarks on why it came to a flood. There is a lesson for the future. It is vitally important that we must carry public opinion with us. There will always be people who do not care very much about it. They will be guided by all kinds of other people, including ourselves and many of the groups which have been referred to tonight.
One of the witnesses for the Friends of the Earth said that he was shaken by the report. He said that he did not realise how fundamentally Parker was inclined to reject their line. There was criticism from the Town and Country Planning Association:
Whatever view one may have of Mr. Parker's judgment of the evidence, the tone is inappropriately subjective and personal to him and couched in terms as though British Nuclear Fuels Limited were innocent unless proved guilty and, even vice versa, that objectors were guilty unless they could prove themselves innocent.
The letter written on 25th April to the Secretary of State for the Environment by the Council for the Protection of Rural England said:
However, we consider that the report as a whole presents a misleading—because incomplete—account of the arguments more generally deployed at the inquiry and we find it disturbing that your view of the merits of the application will have been shaped almost entirely by such a document. … Mr. Justice Parker has set out no detailed account of the arguments deployed on both sides, thus depriving you of the opportunity to appraise for yourself their strengths and weaknesses and if necessary to dissent from his recommendations.


I am sure that the Minister, with his sincerity and his powers of application, and his advisers, will have gone into the matter in great detail. He has shown himself to be competent to deal with many of the criticisms that have been made, and we trust his integrity in the matter. However, it is difficult for many other people, without the benefit of a report more simply set out and set out in the manner described by the CPRE, to follow it with the understanding that we should expect.
The Friends of the Earth, in its document, complained
In no way does it convey the substance of the Inquiry deliberations, nor the balance of arguments there presented.
The right hon. Gentleman will be aware that the New Scientist, on 9th March, referring to the need to reflect the detail and character of the arguments put forward by the objectors, said:
One need not be on their side to note that the report fails to do this and, more seriously, misrepresents views and obfuscates or distorts the context in which those views were tendered to the inquiry.
Those are serious allegations. Perhaps, on reflection, we had that debate too soon before opinion of the kind that I have just described began to coalesce.
Whether the debate came too soon, that debate, plus this truncated debate—at one time I was told that we were to be allowed an hour and a half for it—is not an adequate way in which the House can make up its mind on the matter. I am not calling for delay, but I do not think that a matter as complicated as this should be discussed in this way. When we are considering complicated legislation such as the Finance Bill we have our general debate and our Second Reading and then a Committee of the whole House, considers it. I am not suggesting a Committee of the whole House in this case. I suggest that we use the Select Committee procedure much more strenuously than we have for such a matter.
I recognise that among the objectors there are many who object to the application of nuclear energy in principle. I should be totally out of sympathy with the criticisms of the report did I not believe that they contained criticisms of substance. Some of the criticisms and doubts expressed have been answered today and in the previous debate. Other reservations and doubts may not be refuted

with such a degree of alacrity. Some of the doubts expressed about the report and how it came to make certain recommendations may be cleared up only on the basis of experience.
If some of us—I include myself in this group—let this order go through tonight it will not be because we are totally convinced that the course the right hon. Gentleman has embarked upon is the right one. There are too many disagreements over matters of substance to have that degree of confidence. There are disagreements over Mr. Justice Parker's interpretation of the nuclear proliferation treaty and disagreements over storage and disposal. Too easily did the right hon. Gentleman as the Friends of the Earth say, discard the possibility of long-term storage of spent AGR fuel as an alternative to early reprocessing. There were other comments made on matters concerning the experience of the Canadians with the long-term storage of spent oxide fuel. There is also the the question of the effect on civil liberties for workers—the issue of employees' rights. That is a subject in itself.
We have also to bear in mind the manner in which some witnesses have complained that their evidence was dismissed or not taken sufficiently into account. Professor Radford, the eminent American authority, claims to have been treated in such a way that he could write a letter to The Times saying that the whole inquiry was a piece of window-dressing. I do not agree with him about that. There are, however, men if distinction who have written such words and who command considerable support outside this House. They took the trouble to appear before the inquiry yet have written scathing comments on the report. They carry considerable weight with public opinion.
There is a balance of risk on either side of the argument. It is essential that the Government, of whatever political complexion, should, as experience yields its evidence, have he courage and honesty to change the pace of any decision they have taken or, if necessary, change the decision altogether. It may ultimately prove to be the right decision to set up the reprocessing plant at Wind-scale. The balance of risk may favour the Government taking the decision now to start work at least on the preliminary


stages. I recognise that no plutonium will be produced for 10 years and that the preliminary stages do not involve the taking of irrevocable steps.
I cannot emphasise too strongly that if the Government are to keep faith with the public and those who sincerely hold doubts based on scientific criteria about the wisdom of the Government's decision each stage of the development should be monitored. I understand from what the right hon. Gentleman has said that he has promised the House that this will be the case and that the results of such monitoring will be openly published.
I come now to the system of public inquiry. On reflection I do not think that we should have another such inquiry to look at this whole question of fast-breeder reactors. I hope that we do not think that we have got it right now. I do not believe that we have. We have managed to proceed on non-party political lines and we want to keep it that way. We have been able to maintain within the public at large a fairly balanced and rational approach both on environmental and social-economic grounds. People have been willing to work within the law, which is more than can be said of some other countries. We must preserve this tone in our argument.
The lessons to be learnt are twofold. We have to be a little more generous when it comes to helping those who have to put forward their case at great cost in terms of time and money.
I think there is a need for criteria to be laid down to give financial help to organisations of the sort that have been mentioned. That should be forthcoming. They have managed so far, but I doubt whether many of them will be able to manage when a further inquiry comes our way. Secondly, it would help them enormously, as Sir Colin Buchanan wrote in The Times, that when it comes to the burden of proof the onus should be put on the initiator of a project. In other words, the initiator should be asked to undertake and pay for the research that is required to answer the criticisms.
We should consider the inquiries in two stages. First, I think that we placed too great a burden on Mr. Justice Parker and his two technical assessors. For example, one of the assessors had an especially important

role in the whole question of radiology. There was the development of an argument between him and one of the expert witnesses who was brought in from outside. If we are to avoid placing too great a burden on the judge, it might be that we should have a wider range of experts' views with the purpose of producing a report that would provide the essential technical background for a local planning inquiry as well as for the House of Commons, and not charging the tribunal with the responsibility of producing a report to justify a particular decision, which I think is what happend with the Parker Report.
Such a procedure would involve two distinct stages. One stage would be scientific and technical, and possibly inconclusive. The other stage would be a matter of judgment for a layman with technical advice. It is at that stage that I hope that the House would be invited to play a more profound and informed role.
That role could best be played through the Select Committee system. We have shown ourselves capable of dealing with the matter so far on a non-partisan basis. I hope that we shall continue to do so. We have had some detailed and highly informed contributions today and in previous debates, but it is no reflection on hon. Members on either side of the House when I say that in such debates there are bound to be elements of superficiality and for hon. Members to employ the broad brush of debate. After all, that is the way in which we tend to discuss our affairs—in what I call Second Reading-type debates. Therefore, we miss the opportunity of bringing to bear in a different environment the considered and detailed views of hon. Members on both sides of the House.
That is why I hope that in future the Government will give serious consideration to using the Select Committee system as the instrument that will enable Parliament to probe more deeply and confidently into the complex issues involved in the development and application of nuclear energy.

9.13 p.m.

Mr. Leo Abse: Of necessity the brevity of our contributions must make them didactic, although I much doubt whether any contribution that I or


others make this evening will exceed the dogmatism of the asymmetrical judgments of the Parker Report.
I begin by stating baldly my conclusion. In my judgment, there is no nuclear categorical imperative that compels us to accept reprocessing at this stage. The necessity to give the go-ahead immediately to Windscale arises, in my judgment, only if we accept as inevitable the ultimate creation of a large-scale programme of fast-breeder reactors. No rationale exists behind the immediate acceptance of such expansion unless we have accepted that we must plunge into a plutonium economy, an economy utterly incompatible with a democratic way of life as we know it, and an economy where in pursuit of wealth we shall be putting at risk the whole future of mankind.
It is an affectation that the decision to have fast-breeder reactors is being postponed, is to be decided by some future inquiry in some undetermined form, and is simply irrelevant to what we are now discussing. That view is either deliberately or unwittingly an act of deception. Two major ploys are being used to lull us and deceive us, to distract our attention from the genuine motivation—the preparation for a fast-breeder plutonium economy.
As we have heard from the Secretary of State, the Windscale expansion is needed for waste management—

Mr. Skeet: Mr. Skeetrose—

Mr. Abse: No, I am not giving way. Our time is too short.
The clamour is for an immediate Windscale expansion on the grounds that it is needed for waste management and that, by going ahead now without delay, we can make huge profits by becoming Japan's dustbin.
The first ploy—that Windscale is urgently needed for waste management—is of comparatively recent origin. It flies in the face of the Royal Commission report, which emphasised, as those who have read it know, that
fuel clad in stainless steel or zircaloy could be stored for a few decades in ponds.
Until the Windscale inquiry, the nuclear industry always asserted that spent oxide fuel presented no safety or environmental hazard and could be stored indefinitely without causing concern. It was only

when, that being the case, British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. was challenged why straightforward storage would not be a satisfactory method of interim management of spent oxide fuel that BNFL, as the inquiry evidence reveals, as those who have read it will know, shifted its ground and suddenly began to express reservations about the environmental problems of the storage of spent oxide fuels.
In the light of American experience, British Nuclear Fuels, as the inquiry evidence shows, retreated. How could it do otherwise in the light of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the American Physical Society and the United States Department of Energy, all of which concluded that intact spent fuel may be at least as satisfactory a basis for ultimate disposal as the various wastes arising from reprocessing? Indeed, how could BNFL's belated position be maintained when President Carter, recognising the appalling malignant side effect of nuclear proliferation arising from reprocessing, readily accepted the expert evidence before him of the alternative methods to reprocessing and halted reprocessing in the United States of America?
Then, during the inquiry, British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. retreated to the last ditch available to it to justify reprocessing on waste management grounds. It was reluctantly compelled to concede that zircaloy fuel may be stored for some decades, but that, unlike the Americans, we also had British stainless steel AGR fuel, and British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. claimed to lack the confidence that this could be stored safely for some decades. I find this sudden burst of modesty on the part of British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. highly suspect.
Inquiries of the Central Electricity Generating Board are on record. They disclosed that three United States electricity utilities storing stainless steel clad fuel had advised that they were not experiencing any difficulties. Knowing the eagerness of British Nuclear Fuels Limited to get THORP at all costs, I find utterly unpersuasive—we have had it again today from the Secretary of State with corroboration from the Opposition Front Bench—the manner in which every effort is made to avoid meeting the view that spent AGR fuel could be stored safely within steel bottles within which


the water chemistry could be controlled, or, indeed, not in water filled ponds at all, but in gas cooled facilities—a dry storage technique of which we in Wales nave already had much experience.
Indeed, to insist that we now place all our eggs in the untried basket of Windscale, excluding, in effect, all work on prolonged storage, is to close our options and to increase the likelihood that if THORP at Windscale does not work satisfactorily, like its forerunners have not, there will be no feasible alternative of secure storage of spent fuel open to us.
Perhaps it is because British Nuclear Fuels Limited knows that to rest its request for an immediate right to proceed at Windscale on the basis of waste management needs is unconvincing that, in courteously communicating to many hon. Members and to myself last week, it has rather stressed that, if it cannot sign its contracts now with Japan and others, there would be a considerable loss of business. Even if it were true, that would be no reason to be hustled into such a decision. Should we barter away the liberties and perhaps the lives of our children so that we should live balance-of-payments-free for a few more years? Should our future be so clouded in order to meet the needs of Japanese industrialists? In any event, the tale of loss of contracts is a fable. Who would rush in to take them if we had the wisdom to pause?
Already in France recent events show that public opinion has become increasingly resistant. Everything points to the prerequisite that before France has the needed, extended reprocessing capability which she lacks, there will be even longer and more tumultuous public debate than has taken place here. The loss of contracts story, like the waste management tale, is a colossal bluff which is aimed to stampede the nation into taking the penultimate step into the plutonium economy.
Windscale has one overriding purpose—to produce plutonium for fast-breeder reactors. In passing this order we are walking into a trap. Soothed by the claptrap of the claimed safe waste disposal technique, lured by the prospect of big money from Japan, we shall be moving towards the police State that must accompany any economy resting upon the fuelling,

reprocessing and transportation of plutonium. We shall be shaping an economy which is tailor-made for the intelligent but psychopathic terrorists of the Red Brigades' ilk. For them we shall be providing the full facility to hold, by theft or seizure of small parcels of plutonium, the whole of our society to nuclear blackmail.
To defend ourselves against such destructiveness we shall be forced—so terrified will be the community—to grant powers of vigilance and surveillance that will erode massively our civil liberties, even as meantime our exports of plutonium mean that the capability of making crude but awesome nuclear weapons inevitably will fall into the hands of the Amins and Gadaffis of this world.
The decision tonight will not be the end of the debate. It might be two or three years before a brick is laid on the ground at Windscale. Those will be years when those of us who oppose this order will have the opportunity further to alert public opinion to the self-destructive folly epitomised by Wind-scale. I hope that there will be sufficient hon. Members saying "No" to Wind-scale tonight to give hope to all outside, and particularly to the committed intelligent young, who rightly believe, as I believe, that Windscale is a staging point on the road to Armageddon.

9.23 p.m.

Mr. Nigel Forman: I shall not try to emulate the tone of the hon. Member for Pontypool (Mr. Abse) although I share some of his fundamental reservations. I have undertaken to end my contribution at 9.30 p.m. at the latest in order to leave time for the Front Benches.
The three questions which Mr. Justice Parker put at the beginning of his report, with which hon. Members are familiar, were the wrong questions. I have a version of what I believe to be the right questions.
First, should BNFL be allowed to build the THORP plant on a so-called economic basis with foreign contracts? Secondly, should it be allowed to build THORP on an uneconomic basis without foreign contracts? Thirdly, are there such strong objections to reprocessing on any basis that it should not be done at all or that it should be delayed until further investigation has taken place?
I shall deal briefly with those three questions. If one examines the possibility of an economic THORP one sees that the idea is based upon BNFL's expectation that it will have about £600 million of foreign business which it should be able to exploit on a cost-plus-25 per cent. basis. It is also dependent upon BNFL continuing to get a flow of foreign orders on a comparable basis from 1990 onwards—the earliest date at which I understand the plant is expected to start on a fully operational basis.
This means that the economic attraction, so-called, of THORP can be summarised as follows: first, getting the Japanese and other foreign customers to subsidise our capital costs; secondly, securing some hard foreign currency over a period when we should not need it quite as much as we have needed it in recent years; thirdly, spreading the overall costs of our own reprocessing over a larger throughput up to a planned maximum capacity of 1,200 tonnes a year, so that we may have lower unit costs and hence less of a burden from this source on electricity prices.
On the assumption that these economic assumptions are reliable—and we should bear in mind that it was BNFL that argued that they are—the main question for us in the House is whether these economic benefits are sufficiently reliable and attractive to outweigh the non-economic costs and disadvantages. My own view and that of Mr. Justice Parker, as stated in paragraph 9.17 of his report, is that—I quote from his remarks—
it is as yet too early to reach any final conclusions on the economic position.
In short, the real verdict on the economic advantages is the Scottish one of "not proven". That is something that is borne out also by the MITRE study.
The second question is whether BNFL should be allowed to build an uneconomic THORP. After all, we in this House often sanction developments in technology and other things which are palpably uneconomic, and we seem to do it quite readily. The argument for building an uneconomic plant is based on the contention that we have to reprocess the spent fuel from our own Magnox reactors and AGRs, that reprocessing is the best available technique of waste management, and that doing it under controlled high-standard conditions at Windscale

would reduce rather than increase the risks of nuclear proliferation in the world.
Such an argument is also based upon a number of pretty questionable assumptions. These are assumptions such as the fact that BNFL needs a new plant of the capacity of THORP to deal with, the spent fuel arising from our own Magnox programme. There is the assumption that it is necessarily preferable to reprocess rather than to store the spent fuel from our first five AGRs when they are fully on stream. There is the assumption that we know for sure that closing the nuclear fuel cycle by reprocessing is environmentally preferable to a stowaway fuel cycle in which the spent fuel is stored but retrievable, or, indeed, preferable to other more radical alternatives such as the linear accelerator breeder, for example, which would not involve either enrichment or reprocessing. There is the assumption that the demonstration effect, to which hon. Members have already referred, of going ahead with THORP would discourage rather than encourage others to do likewise elsewhere in the world.
The House will be aware that there is as yet no international expert consensus on these vital issues upon which I have touched. For example, studies recently completed in Sweden suggest that spent nuclear fuel could be stored safely underground for at least 5,000 years in specially designed ceramic containers. Hon. Members will be familiar with the report in The Observer to that effect. Contrast this with the evidence given by BNFL and the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority, reported in paragraph 8.14 of the Parker Report. Yet would hon. Members expect one of the parties to the case to come up with anything other than a vindication of its own practice and its own position? It is hardly likely.
I myself suspect that there is a whole range of technical possibilities and that much depends on the strategic choices first made, in many cases way back in history, and in our case in favour of reprocessing to extract plutonium in the early days for our own nuclear weapons programme.
Then, of course, there is the legitimate doubt concerning the vitrification process with which Mr. Justice Parker said he was


satisfied and predicted that it would succeed because it had to succeed. That was what he said, as reported in paragraph 8.30. What a curious but unfortunate judicial syllogism.
Then there is the general doubt surrounding the preferred method for final disposal for the highly active wastes, on which Mr. Justice Parker's simple but bland comment was that a final solution to the problems of disposal has yet to be found.
I could go on, but I do not have the time to go into the other details. The case is not clearly established and there is very considerable doubt surrounding this whole issue, rested, as it is, upon very dubious assumptions about energy forecasts and so on.
I should like to drop a lengthy letter to the Ministers concerned so that I may put my concerns and my positive contributions and conditions to them. I warn them now that I intend to vote against the order because I think that the argument for delay is persuasive. However, I hope that, even though it may go through tonight, they will give serious and detailed consideration to the conditions which I should like to see attached to the order.

9.30 p.m.

Mr. Tom King: I am sorry that my hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton (Mr. Forman) did not have more time to develop his arguments. We all respect the concerned and informed way in which he approaches this subject. This perhaps draws attention to some of the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for East Grinstead (Mr. Johnson Smith) about the format of our discussion of this matter.
It might be helpful at the start to set the debate in perspective. It is, of course, in the whole context of nuclear power. If we had proof now that there was available to us a more economic energy source, with a proven lower environmental hazard, there would be no need to be discussing nuclear power or this Windscale expansion. But the fact is that, as we look at energy supplies at the moment, with all the uncertainties over the future of energy demand, we are faced with finite oil and gas reserves. We have more

substantial coal reserves, certainly, but we are uncertain how far that coal can fill the gap in possible energy demand at the time when the oil and gas reserves may start to diminish.
There is in any case the argument that it is extremely wasteful to continue to use coal in power stations when, in the words of the Secretary of State for Energy, it may have become too valuable to burn and may be needed as a feedstock for petroleum and gas and as a petrochemical feedstock. I shall return to some of the ways in which we may overcome that problem, but that is a true statement of the present position. It is against that background that we see a use for nuclear power.
As the Secretary of State said, we are, or shortly will be, generating 20 per cent. of our energy by nuclear power. The byproduct, of course, is the production of nuclear waste. We have already been reprocessing nuclear waste for 25 years and we now face the new generation of advanced gas-cooled reactors for the oxide waste of which we have at the moment no reprocessing facility.
It is against that background that we come to the application, which we must determine tonight, by British Nuclear Fuels Ltd., for the expansion of its Wind-scale reprocessing facility for the treatment of the oxide fuel. Looking at the way in which this application has been handled, I should like to pay tribute to the way in which the Parker inquiry was set up by the Secretary of State and to the way in which, in the main, it was conducted.
There have been criticisms of certain aspects of the report and we all accept that that was perhaps inevitable. There was bound to be one disappointed party and many criticisms have been made, but at the end of the inquiry, counsel representing the Friends of the Earth said:
We accept without limitation or hesitation the total integrity and independence of the tribunal from any outside influence.
That was a generous tribute and it was indicative to those of us who followed the inquiry closely of the general tributes which were being paid to Mr. Justice Parker during that inquiry.
The hon. Member for Edinburgh, Central (Mr. Cook) complained about selective quotations by Mr. Justice Parker


and then proceeded to dip into the Foreign Secretary's speech—a speech very critical of President Carter's approach to this problem—for a comment in support of his case. That seemed to me "Parkerism", as he would describe it, at its worst. I was interested that he himself fell victim to that.
The Parker Report was certainly in no sense a whitewash of BNF. No fewer than 12 important recommendations were made, which we are pleased to see have since been accepted by the Government, for considerable tightening up of some of the control procedures around Windscale. BNF would recognise, I think, that some of the past controls operated on that site, particularly in its early stages were not of the standard that we would now expect.
We hope that the process will continue. We also welcome the Parker inquiry because it marks a very important development in the history of nuclear power development in this country. It has been said that in the past it was too much confined to the language of the laboratory. It was a subject to be discussed only by experts privately behind closed doors. This report is a landmark—I do not pretend that it is a perfect landmark—in the process of opening this issue up for much wider discussion.

Mr. Nigel Spearing: A minute or two ago I believe that the hon. Gentleman used the word "tribunal". Even if he did not, would it not have been better if it had been possible for this sort of inquiry to be conducted before a tribunal, not before one judge with assessors?

Mr. King: I hope that we may learn from the process of this inquiry. There is scope for discussing possible alternative ways of approaching the problem of ensuring that public concern is recognised and that these matters are fully aired before as impartial and trustworthy a forum as we can devise. This is a difficult matter of judgment. I believe that the Parker inquiry was the right way to start, and in all the circumstances we support the conclusions that were drawn from it.
We are now faced in this House with a decision. I accept entirely that there has been a statement that this is not an irrevocable step. It could be stopped.

Nothing is to be built for another four years except for a few storage ponds, and they will be needed in any case. None the less, it would be wrong to suggest that this is not an important decision tonight. One of the criticisms of Mr. Justice Parker seemed to imply that he was actually taking a political decision. He made it clear throughout that he was not. He reported to the Secretary of State for the Environment who, with the Secretary of State for Energy, had the responsibility of reporting to the House. It is this House which will take the political decision now. This is an important decision and it would be wrong to pretend otherwise.
I and the majority of my colleagues, although we respect the contrary views that exist, believe that Mr. Justice Parker was right in his conclusion that the construction of this expanded reprocessing plant would actually be helpful in minimising nuclear proliferation, rather than in encouraging it. The Secretary of State said that 27 countries were now embarking upon nuclear power programmes, and that gives some indication of the risks in this area. Those who are a little more technically informed than certain hon. Members are on the ways in which nuclear weapon fuel might be produced by alternative methods will know that this is not a desirable approach in any case. If one wants to encourage people to produce this material themselves the best way is to deny them the facilities elsewhere for it to be done.
The other aspect which the House must recognise—and I endorse what the Secretary of State said on this—is that whatever the commercial, strategic and security of supply arguments, none of these is acceptable if the basic safety and environmental arguments cannot be met. On that basis I accept that on the report that we have, subject to continuing and improved controls in the certain cases specified, the degree of safety is likely to be adequate. I say "likely to be" because I know that many people are concerned that there should be an absolute guarantee of total safety at all times. But consider the whole sphere of energy, including oil and gas. Do not let us forget the "Amoco Cadiz" and the oil tanker at present wrecked off the East Coast. Consider the hazards and environmental problems of oil. Consider the coal industry and the staggering figure quoted by one of my


hon. Friends of 53,000 deaths of miners this century in the course of finding and extracting coal. Consider that we are at this moment with our coal-fired power stations, and on the Government's figures, dropping no less than 100,000 tonnes of sulphur on Norway and Sweden, that being merely the balance remaining out of the 2·5 million tonnes of sulphur annually that emit from our coal-fired power stations.
In those circumstances we cannot pretend that nuclear power represents the sole issue of environmental concern and health hazard on energy. This is not to criticise any of these methods. None of them is without its hazards. They must be seen fairly in the balance.
Two further matters require the attention of the House. Against the background of the uncertainty about future energy supplies and the important part that nuclear power can play, I hope that the Parker Report and these debates have been helpful. I hone that they can help protect Britain from the polarisation of view that is affecting the nuclear debate in certain other countries.
There might at one time have been a feeling that, on the one side, there were some power-crazed Dr. Strangeloves mad on blowing up the world and, on the other, some nature freaks wandering around, as the Secretary of State said, wearing sandals and eating brown bread, and never the twain should meet. There is now a much more serious understanding by each side of the other's position. Merely the immersion in Whitehaven has perhaps been helpful in this respect. On both sides there are serious, informed people.
The nuclear industry has not answered all the questions. There are problems of waste disposal which are as yet totally unresolved and there has been a lack of urgency in seeking to resolve them. However, it is not realistic to believe that nuclear power can be abandoned because there is an easy solution to all the problems. For many environmental reasons, many would maintain that nuclear power is a much safer and a much healthier source of power than some of the present sources of power. This and other serious arguments need to be seriously discussed, and not in the emotional and

totally polarised atmosphere created by one hon. Member today.
The point which must be answered is that raised at the beginning of the debate by the Leader of the Liberal Party. I accept that there is a concern amongst many people that we are embarking on an inflexible and irrevocable course from which there is no turning. The Flowers Report, amongst others, made the point very strongly that if we are, as we feel necessary at present, to depend to a certain extent on nuclear power and to make the necessary provisions for its continuance, it would be wrong at the same time to condemn future generations to having no alternative solution available.
That is why we on this side attach such great importance to pressing on much more vigorously with research into alternative sources of energy. We are not yet able to say how great a contribution could be made by solar power, wind poder, and tidal power. We respect all these concepts and would like to see them implemented. However, the plain fact is that at present nobody in the world can state with certainty just how substantial a source of power they would prove to be.
For that reason, it would be grossly irresponsible at this stage to abandon the nuclear option. Also, it is vital, so that we do not have a single choice at a later stage, to pursue much more actively the research into these resources. If we are also insistent on having the maximum time before being faced with certain choices that we might wish to postpone, we make no apology for putting absolutely at the top of our list the importance of conservation. We are wasting energy conspicuously in every activity of our lives—in industry and in the home. We owe it to those concerned about the development represented in this activity to ensure that we waste no energy and that we give a much greater incentive for conservation for the future.
On those conditions, we shall support the Government in the Lobby tonight.

9.45 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Energy (Mr. Anthony Wedgwood Benn): Perhaps in winding up this debate I may take up the broader vision and the broader issues which the hon. Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King) raised because I, too, feel,


and I suspect that most of the House does, that this debate which has been going on at Windscale alone for nearly three years and which, clearly, will continue on nuclear power for a much longer period has been conducted at a very high level, with a degree of mutual respect not to be found in many countries, and with disagreements which clearly cut right across party lines. Reference was made to the possibility that other decisions might have been taken this way. I think I am right in saying that this is the first time that, as distinct from legislation or the voting of money, the House of Commons has been asked to take a decision on a project itself in a vote, and I regard that as very important.
Perhaps I might try to analyse the choice that has to be made in the Division Lobbies in 15 minutes' time. Let me deal first with what this debate is not about. It is not a theological dispute about the intrinsic merit of nuclear power. We are talking about electricity and how we can get it. I agree very strongly with the hon. Member for Bridgwater. If alternatives were available, many people might take a different view about nuclear power. We are talking about electricity that we think we need, and we are not engaged in an argument between "goodies" and "baddies" because, in my opinion, both sides of this argument have contributed greatly to the debate and the decision that we now have to take.
Can anybody object to environmentalists who have insistently brought to the attention of Parliament factors of safety, problems of accidents, problems of terrorism, problems of civil liberties, problems of proliferation and, indeed, have said that we have a responsibility as stewards of the planet? Can anyone really object to nuclear scientists who, as young men may have seen Hiroshima and Nagasaki deciding to devote their lives to Atoms for Peace, and for whom the whole operation of civil nuclear power is the classic case of swords into ploughshares or spears into pruning hooks? I have heard in some of the debate—I merely mention this, not in complaint—a discussion as though we were considering the neutron bomb, and not the use of nuclear power for civil purposes.
What we are being asked to do tonight is to take a balanced political judgment

between two known risks. One is the risk of reprocessing, which nobody in his senses could deny exists, and the other is the risk of energy shortage by relying solely on non-nuclear means. The case for Windscale is solely an energy case, and any energy Minister looking at the possibilities of meeting our demand by supply is bound to be afflicted more and more by the uncertainty over all fuels. How long will the oil last? Will it be interfered with by an embargo? How long will the gas last? What about the coal? Can it be obtained? Hew quickly can we rely upon the alternatives—and I share the view of the hon. Member for Bridgwater about the need to develop alternative energy—to meet our need? How much will conservation give, because it is a long programme? How easy will uranium be to get when countries that have it may well lay down conditions for its supply, as the Americans have done, and as Namibia and Australia have done? There are many political hazards there.
With a 10-year lead time—as the hon. Member for Bridgwater said, there are environmental hazards with all fuels as anyone who knows about the Vale of Belvoir or the Ekofisk blow-out will remember—all the forecasts point to a nuclear component, and this has emerged from analysis and from consultation not only in the United Kingdom; this is the view of the United States, of the Soviet Union, of the International Atomic Energy Agency and of the EEC.
If we look ahead at the mix of fuels which we think we shall need in this country in the year 2000, it is not possible to abstract the nuclear component without running a serious risk which no energy Minister could recommend to the House. That is the argument which has to be presented.
I believe that if, for the best of reasons in the world—I make no complaint even about the language used by those who argue the other case—that other case were to prevail, our energy policy as it has developed by general agreement would have to be completely recast. British industry would be greatly affected, the self-sufficiency upon which we rest so much would no longer be assured, and the economic consequences of seeking to import energy to replace the nuclear power would transform our long-term economic prospects.
That is the argument in its simplest form, and I should be failing in my duty if I did not put it forward. I am putting forward the argument. I listened to the right hon. Member for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles (Mr. Steel) very carefully, and I hope that he will listen to me.

Mr. David Penhaligon: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Benn: No. There is very little time, and I hope the hon. Gentleman will forgive me; I agreed to a curtailment.
But, all that being said, there is no reason why, as we advance the energy case, the House, the Government and the country should not examine in detail, as we have done, the environmental arguments, and to those I now come.
Of course, the risk of accident cannot be brushed aside. Of course, the risk of terrorism cannot be put out of mind, or, if the risk of terrorism is to be minimised, the impact upon civil liberties which that would involve cannot be put out of mind. In my view, the most powerful argument is the argument about proliferation, and I shall return to that.
As regards waste disposal, my right hon. Friend made the point that the problem is technically soluble but has not been solved on a commercial scale adequate to meet the demands. That is a perfectly proper question to bring forward.
Where I disagree is when it is said that we do not need the energy at all. I think that there are some who are too optimistic—I do not refer to hon. Members—about the forecasts or are taking account of the impact of a permanent slump which might solve our energy problem in ways which would be quite unacceptable to me.
The question is not whether these are valid points because, of course, they are valid points. The question is whether they are so decisive as to justify overturning the basic energy policy, with all the risks which I have described. I believe that it is to that question that our judgment tonight will have to be directed.
How should the question be decided? Some would say that it is a matter for the experts. I do not accept that. Others say that it is for officials. I do not accept that, either. Others say that it is for the

Cabinet, where decisions of this kind have always been made in the past, behind the closed curtains of the Official Secrets Act.
What we have decided is that we want the House of Commons to decide this matter because it is essentially a matter of political judgment. Everyone voting in the Lobbies tonight is accountable for the decision he takes. There is no certainty. It is a matter of judgment.
Since the Government have been involved in handling this matter over a long period, I think it only fair to set its chronology upon the record for the consideration of the House. The proposal came to me first in September 1975. The Cabinet discussed it. British Nuclear Fuels had two meetings, one in Cumbria and one in London, in order to ensure that the case was understood. I went to Tokyo to discuss with the Japanese Government arrangements under which the waste would be returned.
In March 1976 the Government's decision was announced by me, that in their view it was all right. Then, in December, after a great deal of public discussion and after the responsibility for waste management had been transferred, with my 100 per cent. support, to my right hon. Friend, the inquiry was set up. The inquiry went on from June to November, the report came out in January, we had our debate in March, the recommendations were accepted, and tonight comes the decision which has to be made.
No one in his senses could describe that as a charade. Of course, it was not a charade. It was an absolutely genuine examination of the issue. We have had the Flowers Report on the question of pollution. The Department of the Environment has taken responsibility. The Foreign Office is playing its part in the international discussions on nonproliferation, and here I join most sincerely in praising President Carter for seeking to bring nuclear matters back under political control in the United States. We have, out of all this, agreed that the fast-breeder reactor will be subjected to a similarly independent scrutiny before the House has to decide the matter.
I do not honestly believe that even the sternest critics of what we are proposing tonight in the order could deny that we have opened it up, that we have encouraged discussion, and that many other


bodies besides the House of Commons—the churches, the institutions, political parties, trade unions and so on—have all joined in the debate. We have provided an opportunity for the arguments to be put. We have sought independent advice from the Parker Commission, we have joined in the international talks, and deferred the decision for two years. If it did not seem real to some hon. Members, it certainly did to the Japanese, who were waiting to know where they were—and I saw them on many occasions. Finally, it has been put to the House of Commons.
It would be quite unjust to describe that as a fraud, a charade or a deception. It is not. I can fully understand the disappointment of the environmentalists that their view did not prevail with BNFL, with Mr. Justice Parker or with the Government. But BNFL, the Parker inquiry and the Government are not deciding the matter. The decision will be made in a few moments in this Chamber. The issues which have been raised by the environmentalists will, in my judgment, always be upon the agenda.
I believe that it is something that we are able to conduct an argument in this House and in this country on nuclear power that is quite different from the way in which it has been conducted in other countries—I take up what the hon. Member for Bridgwater said. I believe that that is a very important factor, and one justifying the open government that we have undertaken.
I certainly contrasted in my own mind some of the television pictures of nuclear demonstrations in other countries with the orderly and quiet discussions and public meeting which took place in Trafalgar Square not so long ago. At any rate, the environmentalists are not lumped as chaotics or subversives or people whose arguments are absolutely destined to be hopeless and ineffective, for they have been and will remain, I hope—since all of us are environmentalists with a similar concern—valued participants in the discussion.
That is the Government's case. After three years of discussion, the Government believe that the nuclear component is necessary for the energy policy of the United Kingdom; that a Windscale expansion of the kind proposed is necessary for that nuclear component to develop properly and that the objections

raised, important as they are, do not justify the rejection of the order as has been proposed by the leader of the Liberal Party tonight.
I therefore invite the House to vote against the Prayer, to let the special development order proceed, and to ensure that in the years that lie ahead we learn from what we have achieved, and in future permit these discussions to go forward in the same open spirit that we have had in the last two years.
Questions were raised—I think by the hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine)—about what further stages there will be in this process. There will be a large number of stages when the House can review the progress of this plant at Wind-scale. There will be many other opportunities for further projects to be examined with the same detailed scrutiny as the one that we have applied to the Windscale project itself.
I believe that those who put their arguments forward can at least be satisfied that they have been taken into account. I invite the House, therefore, to reject the Prayer and to let the order issue.

Question put,
That the Town and Country Planning (Windscale and Calder Works) Special Development Order 1978 (S.I., 1978, No. 523), dated 3rd April 1978, a copy of which was laid before this House on 3rd April, be withdrawn.

The House proceeded to a Division—

Mr. Clement Freud: (seated and covered): On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Is it in order for an hon. Member who has gone through the Division Lobby and realised that he has made a mistake to ask the Clerk to delete his name from the voting record and then to go back and vote in the other Lobby?

Mr. Speaker: Had he passed the Tellers? That is what I should like to know.

Mr. Freud: He has passed the Tellers and his name has been marked off.

Mr. Speaker: All he can do is go through the other Lobby and cancel it.

Mr. Spencer Le Marchani: (seated and covered): On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I am the hon. Member involved in this matter. I went into the Lobby. I gave my name and then


realised that I was in the wrong Lobby. I did not pass the Tellers. I came out in the correct manner and went into the correct Lobby.

Mr. Speaker: I am obliged to the hon. Gentleman. That ought to settle everything.

The House having divided: Ayes 80, Noes 224.

Division No. 208]
AYES
[9.59 p.m.


Abse, Leo
Hayman, Mrs Helene
Richardson, Miss Jo


Bidwell, Sydney
Henderson, Douglas
Rodgers, George (Chorley)


Biffen, John
Hicks, Robert
Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)


Blenkinsop, Arthur
Hooson, Emlyn
Shaw, Arnold (Ilford South)


Body, Richard
Howells, Geraint (Cardigan)
Sillars, James


Bowden, A. (Brighton, Kemptown)
Hunt, David (Wirral)
Skinner, Dennis


Buchan, Norman
Irving, Charles (Cheltenham)
Smith, Cyril (Rochdale)


Butler, Mrs Joyce (Wood Green)
Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)
Smith, Dudley (Warwick)


Canavan, Dennis
Johnston, Russell (Inverness)
Spearing, Nigel


Castle, Rt Hon Barbara
Kilroy-Silk, Robert
Stanbrook, Ivor


Clemitson, Ivor
Langford-Holt, Sir John
Steel, Rt Hon David


Colquhoun, Ms Maureen
Latham, Arthur (paddington)
Stewart, Rt Hon Donald


Cook, Robin F. (Edin C)
Lee, John
Thomas, Dafydd (Merioneth)


Corbett, Robin
Litterick, Tom
Thomas, Ron (Bristol NW)


Dean, Joseph (Leeds West)
Madden, Max
Thompson, George


Edge, Geoff
Maynard, Miss Joan
Thorne, Stan (Preston S)


Ellis, John (Brigg &amp; Scun)
Mendelson, John
Thorpe, Rt Hon Jeremy) (N Devon)


Evans, Gwynfor (Carmarthen)
Mikardo, Ian
Tilley, John (Lambeth, Central)


Flannery, Martin
Mills, Peter
Torney, Tom


Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)
Moonman, Eric
Whitehead, Philip


Fookes, Miss Janet
Morris, Michael (Northampton S)
Whitlock, William


Forman, Nigel
Mudd, David
Wigley, Dafydd


Freud, Clement
Newton, Tony
Willey, Rt Hon Frederick


Garrett, John (Norwich S)
Pardoe, John
Wise, Mrs Audrey


Gould, Bryan
Parry, Robert



Gow, Ian (Eastbourne)
Pavitt, Laurie
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Grist, Ian
Price, C. (Lewisham W)
Mr. A. J. Beith and


Grocott, Bruce
Rhodes, James R.
Mr. David Penhaligon.




NOES


Anderson, Donald
Cunningham, Dr J. (Whiteh)
Harrison, Rt Hon Walter


Archer, Rt Hon Peter
Davidson, Arthur
Hayhoe, Barney


Armstrong, Ernest
Davies, Denzil (Lianelli)
Healey, Rt Hon Denis


Arnold, Tom
Davis, Clinton (Hackney C)
Heseltine, Michael


Bagier, Gordon A. T.
Deakins, Eric
Higgins, Terence L.


Banks, Robert
de Freitas, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey
Horam, John


Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)
Dell, Rt Hon Edmund
Howell, David (Guildford)


Barnett, Rt Hon Joel (Heywood)
Dewar, Donald
Howell, Rt Hon Denis (B'ham, Sm H)


Bates, Alf
Doig, Peter
Howell, Ralph (North Norfolk)


Benn, Rt Hon Anthony Wedgwood
Dormand, J. D.
Huckfield, Les


Benyon, W.
Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James
Hughes, Mark (Durham)


Berry, Hon Anthony
Drayson, Burnaby
Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)


Bishop, Rt Hon Edward
Duffy, A. E. P.
Hunter, Adam


Boardman, H.
Dunnett, Jack
Jay, Rt Hon Douglas


Booth, Rt Hon Albert
Eadie, Alx
Jenkin, Rt Hon P. (Wanst'd &amp; W'df'd)


Bottomley, Rt Hon Arthur
Ellis, Tom (Wrexham)
John, Brynmor


Brooke, Peter
Emery, Peter
Johnson Smith, G. (E Grinstead)


Brown, Hugh D. Provan)
Ennals, Rt Hon David
Jones, Alec (Rhondda)


Brown, Robert C. (Newcastle W)
Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)
Jones, Arthur (Daventry)


Brown, Ronald (Hackney S)
Evans, John (Newton)
Jones, Barry (East Flint)


Buchanan, Richard
Ewing, Harry (Stirling)
Jopling, Michael


Butler, Adam (Bosworth)
Fell, Anthony
Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald


Campbell, Ian
Fitch, Alan (Wigan)
Kellett-Bowman, Mrs Elaine


Carlisle, Mark
Foot, Rt Hon Michael
Kershaw, Anthony


Cartwright, John
Ford, Ben
King, Tom (Bridgwater)


Chalker, Mrs Lynda
Forrester, John
Kitson, Sir Timothy


Churchill, W. S.
Fowler, Gerald (The Wrekin)
Knox, David


Clark, Alan (Plymouth, Sutton)
Fraser, John (Lambeth, N'w'd)
Lambie, David


Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)
Freeson, Rt Hon Reginald
Lamborn, Harry


Clegg, Waiter
Garrett, W. E. (Wallsend)
Lamond, James


Cocks, Rt Hon Michael (Bristol S)
Gilbert, Dr John
Lawson, Nigel


Cohen, Stanley
Ginsburg, David
Leadbitter, Ted


Coleman, Donald
Glyn, Dr Alan
Le Marchant, Spencer


Conlan, Bernard
Golding, John
Lester, Jim (Beeston)


Cope, John
Goodhart, Philip
Lever, Rt Hon Harold


Costain, A. P.
Grant, George (Morpeth)
Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)


Cowans, Harry
Grant, John (Islington C)
Luard, Evan


Cox, Thomas (Tooting)
Gray, Hamish
Mabon, Rt Hon Dr J. Dickson


Craigen, Jim (Maryhill)
Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)
McCartney, Hugh


Crawshaw, Richard
Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)
McCrindle, Robert


Critchley, Julian
Hannam, John
McElhone, Frank


Crouch, David
Hardy, Peter
MacFarquhar, Roderick


Crowther, Stan (Rotherham)
Harper, Joseph
McGuire, Michael (Ince)




MacKenzie, Rt Hon Gregor
Pym, Rt Hon Francis
Steen, Anthony (Wavertree)


Maclennan, Robert
Radice, Giles
Stewart, Rt Hon M. (Fulham)


Marks, Kenneth
Rathbone, Tim
Stoddart, David


Marshall, Dr Edmund (Goole)
Rees, Rt Hon Merlyn (Leeds S)
Stradling Thomas. J.


Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)
Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon
Strang, Gavin


Mather, Carol
Ridley, Hon Nicholas
Summerskill, Hon Dr Shirley


Mawby, Ray
Robinson, Geoffrey
Taylor, Teddy (Cathcart)


Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin
Rodgers, Rt Hon William (Stockton)
Tebbit, Norman


Meyer, Sir Anthony
Roper, John
Temple-Morris, Peter


Millan, Rt Hon Bruce
Ross, Rt Hon W. (Kilmarnock)
Thomas, Mike (Newcastle E)


Miller, Hal (Bromsgrove)
Ross, William (Londonderry)
Tinn, James


Moate, Roger
Rowlands, Ted
Tomlinson, John


Monro, Hector
Ryman, John
Viggers, Peter


Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)
Sandelson, Neville
Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V)


Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)
Sedgemore, Brian
Walker, Terry (Kingswood)


Morrison, Hon Peter (Chester)
Sever, John
Wall, Patrick


Moyle, Rt. Hon. Roland
Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)
Watkins, David


Mulley, Rt Hon Frederick
Shaw, Michael (Scarborough)
Weatherill, Bernard


Neubert, Michael
Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert
Wellbeloved, James


Newens, Stanley
Shepherd, Colin
Wells, John


Normanton, Tom
Shersby, Michael
White, Frank R. (Bury)


Oakes, Gordon
Shore, Rt Hon Peter
White, James (Pollock)


O'Halloran, Michael
Silkin, Rt Hon John (Deptford)
Whitelaw, Rt Hon William


Orme, Rt Hon Stanley
Silkin, Rt Hon S. C. (Dulwich)
Williams, Alan Lee (Hornch'ch)


Osborn, John
Silverman, Julius
Wilson, William (Coventry SE)


Page, Rt Hon R. Graham (Crosby)
Sims, Roger
Winterton, Nicholas


Page, Richard (Workington)
Skeet, T. H. H.
Woodall, Alec


Palmer, Arthur
Smith, Rt. Hon. John (N Lanarkshire)
Wrigglesworth, Ian


Park, George
Smith, Timothy John (Ashfield)
Younger, Hon George


Parker, John
Snape, Peter



Pattie, Geoffrey
Spicer, Jim (W Dorset)
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Perry, Ernest
Spicer, Michael (S Worcester)
Mr. James Hamilton and


Price, William (Rugby)
Spriggs, Leslie
Mr. Ted Graham.

Question accordingly negatived.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Ordered,
That the consideration of Lords Amendments to the Housing (Financial Provisions) (Scotland) Bill may be proceeded with at this day's sitting, though opposed, until any hour.—[Mr. Frank R. White.]

Orders of the Day — HOUSING (FINANCIAL PROVISIONS) (SCOTLAND) BILL

Lords amendments considered.

Clause 2

APPORTIONMENT OF HOUSING SUPPORT GRANTS

Lords Amendment: No. 1, in page 3, line 22, leave out "that year" and insert "in question".

The Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Hugh D. Brown): I beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.
This is a purely drafting amendment.

Question put and agreed to.

Lords Amendment: No. 2, in page 3, line 34, leave out "local authorities' expenditure on housing." and insert "eligible expenditure.".

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.
This is another drafting amendment.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 8

REPAIRS GRANT

Lords Amendment: No. 3, in page 7, line 41, after "5(1)," insert "(1A),".

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.
With this it would be convenient to take Lords Amendment No. 14.
These amendments are purely drafting amendments and clarify the consequential amendments and other changes to the Housing (Scotland) Act 1974 made elsewhere in the Bill.

Clause 15

RESERVE POWER TO LIMIT RENTS

Lords Amendment: No. 4, in page 12, line 6, leave out "increases" and insert "any increase (a)"

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.

Mr. Speaker: With this we may also discuss Lords Amendment No. 5, page 12, line 7, at end insert—
(b) in average income receivable from the standard rents of all houses or part shares of houses,

Mr. Brown: These are important amendments and satisfy I hope, the spirit of an amendment that was moved in Committee by my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, Central (Mr. Cook). I gave an undertaking then that the order-making power could be used, if necessary, to limit average rent increases of authorities. The amendments are needed to make absolutely clear that the power could be used in that way.

10.15 p.m.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: The Minister should at least give us more explanation about what is planned here. This proposal seems to depart so much from the Government's previous statements and from their manifesto commitments that we need to know exactly where we are.
Hon. Members will be aware that when the Government were elected they said that they said that they would do certain things in housing and would deal with the issue of rents. We had first, as I am sure the Under-Secretary will be aware because he will have told this to his constituents, an assurance that the Government would reverse the serious fall in the housing programme. That was in 1974. We have just had the Government's latest housing figures for Scotland which show that the total number of houses built was the lowest since 1962. Far from reversing a decline, the Government have made the situation worse.
Labour Members, such as the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Mr. Lambie), and others complained bitterly about the Conservative's Housing Finance Act, speaking of the vicious rent rises planned. A great deal of capital was made out of that. Our Act provided for an average increase per year per house of £39. This was regarded as scandalous. Under this legislation the Government have removed the amount which we specified for rent increases. Instead of moving in the direction they promised, the Government have gone to a situation in which the top limit for rent increases specified in the legislation has been entirely removed. Instead the Government seek to replace that limit by the words in Lords Amendment No. 5.
Are the Government saying that they hope to have control over increases for specific houses and for the generality of council houses in any district council area? Would it not be more sensible to allow local authorities a little more flexibility? The Minister described the amendment as "important" but that is not really so. It is simply an attempt by the Government to pacify people such as the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire who compaigned bitterly against the sensible Conservative Housing Rents and Subsidies (Scotland) Act which gave, for the first time, a real protection to tenants with limited incomes and which gave a specified amount for average rent increases. The Government have simply removed the top limit placed on such increases.
The Government have much to answer for in connection with their housing manifesto. They said that they would increase house building. It has slumped. They said that they would repeal our housing Act. All that they have repealed is the top limit on rent increases. They also said that they would try to clarify the situation. They have made it more complicated.
On a more general point, you will be aware, Mr. Speaker, as the protector of our rights in this House of Commons, that there are three important amendments to which we are coming. The Minister is well known as one of the Labour Party's Left wingers. We can see that he has had the corners cut off him by the responsibilities of Ministerial power. I hope that those who are still

true to the extreme Left traditions, as I know the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire tries to pretend that he is, together with the hon. Member for West Stirlingshire (Mr. Canavan), who speaks a great deal of Left-wing nonsense—

Mr. Dennis Canavan: I am a well-known moderate.

Mr. Taylor: I hope that the Minister will share the views of moderates like myself and consider what would have been the position of this Bill if we had not had the House of Lords to make sense of what, unfortunately, is a hastily planned Bill, with many drafting and other faults.
If we had not been able to rely on another place to sort out the Bill that left the Government and the draftsmen in such confusion, we would have been in a difficult situation. I hope that in answering the debate the Minister, along with his colleagues, will pay tribute to another place for the work that it has done in making sense of a Bill that left this place in rather a sorry state.

Mr. William Ross: Is the hon. Gentleman for or against the amendments?

Mr. Taylor: If the Minister will make an honest endeavour to explain the exact result of the amendments—we are wondering whether they are necessary—I shall be only too glad to give a clear indication whether we think that they are good. As the Minister has not clarified the position to the satisfaction of my hon. Friends, I am afraid that at present the answer is "I do not know".

Mr. Hector Monro: I agree with the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Taylor), especially those at the end of his contribution about not knowing whether the amendments are good. The new subsection will read as follows:
The Secretary of State may by order limit or restrict any increase (a) in income receivable from the standard rent of any house or any part share thereof (b) an average income receivable from the standard rents of all houses or part shares of houses to which a local authority's housing revenue account relates.
Who on earth is supposed to understand all that? Is that the very best that another place can do in drafting? I have


rarely found a more complicated subsection. I hope that the Minister will try to explain the intention of the subsection in basic English.

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: About three-quarters of the contributions of the hon. Member for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Taylor) had nothing to do with the amendments. However, we are used to that. I hope that my hon. Friends will not be provoked by his mistatements in putting some of us into a Left-wing category and others of us into a Right-wing category.
It is totally consistent with the Government's views to give freedom to local authorities. However, freedom has to be exercised with responsibility. There cannot be the dictation that the hon. Member for Cathcart was talking about, including threatening Clydebank and those in other areas.
We believe in giving freedom, and the assurance that I have given is quite consistent with that policy. I refer to a fallback position of having power to make an order that could do one or two things or both, either to limit the increase in rent of an individual house or the average increase in rent income of an authority. The amendments make that clear, and that power is quite consistent with our philosophy and the assurances that I have given.

Mr. George Younger: I hope that the House will understand that if I find the Government's conversion so breathtaking that I cannot let this occasion pass without commenting on it briefly. I recall all that we went through during the passage of the Housing Finance (Scotland) Act 1972. Is the Minister saying that the party which spent week after week in 1972 complaining its head off about the provisions of our Bill, which put an absolute limit on any rent increase of £39 in a year and a limit on the average rent increase of £26 in a year, now proposes that there should be no specific limits? Has this proposition been referred to the Labour Party Conference for its approval? I very much doubt whether it has.
It seems that in 1972 I and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland, as he then was, who is now

Lord Campbell of Croy, were far too gentle. However, I cannot object to that which the Government propose. It appears that the Labour Party does not want any limits. It seems that it wishes only to have the power to step in at the last moment when matters have developed and it is probably too late. The Government will produce an Order-in-Council. We all know what that means. There will be months of delay before anything is done.
Council tenants in Scotland will have no assurance that any help from the Labour Government will come to them if their local authority imposes unreasonable rent increases. We are witnessing an amazing conversion. I recommend to my hon. Friends that we in no way oppose the enlightened view of the Scottish Office. At long last it appears that there is some glimmer of sense appearing in the Labour Government's housing policy. However, they will have to make their peace with the Labour activists at local level and I am sure that they will not like it.

Mr. Speaker: With the leave of the House, I shall put the two amendments together.

Question put and agreed to.

Lords amendment No. 5 agreed to.

Clause 19

CITATION, COMMENCEMENT AND EXTENT

Lords amendment: No. 6, in page 13, line 21, leave out "27 and 28" and insert "28, 32 and 33".

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.
This, again, is another drafting amendment which clarifies the numbering of the paragraphs.

Question put and agreed to.

Schedule 2

MINOR AND CONSEQUENTIAL AMENDMENTS

Lords amendment: No. 7, in page 16, line 25, after "includes" insert "(a)".

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.

Mr. Speaker: With this amendment we may take Lords Amendments Nos. 8 and 9.

Mr. Brown: I hope that these amendments will have the support of the Opposition. They tidy up and give effect to the intention of an Opposition amendment that we accepted in Committee.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: As far as I can see, the amendment makes it clear that a repairs notice can be issued to commercial premises in a tenement block as well as to householders. This matter is not entirely clear to me. Is this simply stating that a notice will be issued to the commercial premises—perhaps the small shop under the tenement flats—or does it give the Government or the local authority any power to assist the owner of commercial premises in the event of the repair being substantial? We know that there are repairs grants for householders. Has this matter been given consideration? Will the repairs grant be extended to cover the owner of a shop with a small turnover and facing hard times, particularly in areas from which people are moving away?
As far as I can see, the amendment ensures only that the notice will be served and that something must be done about the roof, or whatever it may be. Is there any provision, if hardship is proved, for the owners of small shops to get help with repairs, some of which can be substantial?

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: There is not, in fact. I think that the hon. Member for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Taylor) is trying to have it both ways. He asked in Committee that there should not be provision and that it should be made clear that the owners of commercial premises or shops below tenements should be liable for their share of the repairs. That is what we are ensuring.

Mr. Younger: The Minister's memory may not be absolutely accurate. We had lengthy discussions in Committee about the position of the small corner shop—perhaps essential in a housing scheme—the owner of which, particularly now, when small businesses are under tremendous pressure because of the failure of

the Government's economic policies, may find it difficult to keep his head above water without having to face a sudden request for repairs. A householder in that position has the protection of Acts, grants and so on, but the small shopkeeper does not.
Does the Minister recall the descriptions that we discussed at an earlier stage of the Bill? We referred to the fact that a law that applies to a small branch of a multiple concern which has plenty of resources behind it is one thing, and that we would all expect such a commercial concern to be able to afford to meet its obligations without public subsidy, but that the small individually owned local corner shop is another matter. The owner of such a business may find it every bit as hard as a householder with a small income who is suddenly faced with a bill for, perhaps, £1,000 for his share of the repair to the property.
Has the Minister thought about this matter since we discussed it in Committee? We particularly asked that he should.
Surely he is obliged to try to find a way of covering the small local shop which has no resources. There are hundreds of these small shops throughout our cities. If they are not given some assistance, many will have to close their doors. If they do, some housing schemes will be disadvantaged. Old people in the vicinity may find that the local corner shop, to which they are able to walk, perhaps with difficulty, no longer exists, and that may make a major difference to the life of the community.
10.30 p.m.
I am disappointed that the Minister has not taken that point. Hon. Members on all sides will agree that this is a genuine case. We must not pass legislation which suits the well-off chain of shops with resources but which does not cover the small shopkeeper.
I suppose that it is too late to ask the Minister to think further about the Bill, but could he at least consult the interested bodies? Perhaps he could consult the chamber of commerce in Glasgow and the Scottish Grocer's Federation, which might have views about this matter. He is obliged to undertake to make inquiries and, by letter through the usual channels, to


the House or the Scottish Grand Committee, to make a statement about what he will do if a small shopkeeper without resources receives a bill which he cannot afford. I do not think that we can leave the matter like this.

Mr. Neil Carmichael: I am anxious about this matter, which I have raised in correspondence on a number of occasions. Perhaps I am misinterpreting, but I thought that the Lords amendment, which reads
line 25, after 'houses' insert; 'or (b) a house or houses and other premises.'".
was a concession to meet the serious problem that exists not particularly in the housing estates, where the shops tend to be fairly new, but in the older areas, where isolated shops have served the area for generations.
I agree that there are problems. I do not know how one would distinguish between the small shop which is part of a large chain and the genuine one-man business. One of the cases which I have mentioned to the Minister involved a man who had six shops whereas just round the corner a woman had nothing. The district valuers price was low and the woman was trapped. She could neither get out nor continue with the repairs.
I hope that my hon. Friend would give some aid. I thought that
a house or houses and other premises
gave us an opportunity to help the small shopkeeper in an old community.

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I recognise that there is a genuine problem; I do not attempt to conceal that. There was a discussion in Committee, as my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Kelvin-grove (Mr. Carmichael) will recollect, since he has raised this matter with me a number of times.
In the amendment we are making clear that there is a liability on the owner of premises—a liability about which there was a doubt. We are not dealing with the genuine problem to which the hon. Member for Ayr (Mr. Younger) referred. I assure him that I shall not be allowed to drop the issue, not just because of pressure from hon. Members but because it is a genuine problem, particularly in the East End project.
We are talking not about housing estates but about areas where, unfortunately,

there is a decline in the need for small shops as a result of changing trading patterns. Because of the operation of the competitive system some shops are becoming less competitive. I agree that any additional burden could put the small shopkeepers out of business.
I shall not get off the hook, but this is not the place to argue the issue. I assure the House that this is a matter of concern. We are looking at ways of trying to build in some type of discretion that will help in those genuine cases which hon. Members have mentioned.
This is a difficult matter, because inevitably we are back into a means-testing set of circumstances. I am not sure that we are all agreed that that is the right way to proceed. But I recognise that there is a problem.
I have had no representations from the chambers of commerce or from the Scottish Grocers' Federation or any other body. I have simply had representations from individual Members of Parliament who have had the matter drawn to their attention by constituents, quite properly. However, I agree that this is a matter that will need our attention in the future. All that I can promise is that I recognise the problem and that we shall be as helpful as we can in trying to overcome it.

Mr. Speaker: With the leave of the House, I shall put together the Questions on Lords Amendments Nos. 7, 8 and 9.

Question put and agreed to.

Lords Amendments Nos. 8 and 9 agreed to.

Lords Amendment: No. 10, in page 16, line 39, at end insert—
8A. In section 16(3) (rent allowances to private tenants)—

(a) after the word "person" where it first occurs there shall be inserted "(a)";
(b) at the end there shall be added the words "or (b) who is a tenant of a house which has or had on the appropriate day a rateable value not exceeding £600 and who would be such a protected tenant or statutory tenant if the house of which he is a tenant has had on the appropriate day a rateable value not exceeding £200.

In this subsection "appropriate day" means—

(i) in relation to any house which on 1st April 1978 comprised or formed part of land and heritages for which a rateable value was shown on the valuation roll then in force, means that date, and


(ii) in relation to any other house means the date on which such a value is or was first shown on the valuation roll, and in paragraph (b) of this subsection any reference to a protected tenant or statutory tenant shall include a reference to such a lessee as is mentioned in paragraph (a) of this subsection".

(8B) In section 16(4), (5) and (5A) for the words "under a tenancy which would be a protected tenancy", "and his tenancy would be a protected tenancy" and "to which Part VII of the Act of 1971 would apply" where-ever they occur there shall be substituted the the words "where he would be a private tenant".

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.
This is a rather lengthy amendment. To summarise, we have discovered a slight anomaly in the application of the rent allowance scheme. It arises because of the recent revaluation. It affects only new property. It is nothing to do with security of tenure tinder the Rent Act. If we did not make this change, it would mainly have the effect of excluding housing association houses, which could debar people from attracting a rent allowance simply if the rateable value figure was left at £200.
This is quite constructive. It will certainly be helpful and it is needed particularly by tenants of housing associations.

Mr. Younger: I welcome this amendment very much. I was interested to see this matter arising in the debates in another place. This is a necessary amendment. It is a pity that we all overlooked it earlier. But once more it amazes and greatly pleases me to see the extent to which the Government now so much support the rent allowance scheme that they are prepared to bring it up to date in this way and make sure that it continues.
I cannot forget the bitter opposition that there was to the introduction of the rent allowance scheme in 1972 and how, over many weeks, Labour Members, including the Minister—but not, perhaps, as strongly as his colleagues—fought line by line against the whole concept of allowances. It was particularly amazing in view of the fact that they had themselves introduced the fair rent scheme for private tenants without any rent allowance scheme at all.
That was the situation that we found when we came to office, so we brought in the rent allowance scheme thinking that it was something that no one could oppose and something that would give help to tenants who found that the rent they had to pay was too much for them. That was bitterly opposed, as hon. Members must fully remember.
It is always nice to be able to say "Thank you" to someone, and to congratulate even the Labour Party when it sees the error of its ways. I am a very happy man tonight to find that after all that time, since 1972, the rent allowance scheme has been accepted by the present Government as a permanent feature. I give the Minister the fullest credit for his part in converting his colleagues to this.
The only other fact that I should like to mention on this fascinating subject is that we are having to increase the rateable value limit for these houses, which are newly constructed, from the previous figure of £200, which was quite sufficient to cover the houses of this standard and get them into the scheme under the old rateable values, to £600.
There are two points that I should like to make about that. The first is that it is astonishing that the rateable value increases should be of such a large order. Grants on these houses would have been within the £200 limit until this year, when the new rateable values have had to be raised on average by three times to reflect the drastic effects of the gross inflation which this Government have allowed to get quite out of control since 1974. We see in this amendment the literal effect of that situation.
It may seem a small point, but for the average householder this increase is not enough. The average rise in Scotland is between 3·1 and 3·2 times. Can the Minister assure us that no one who would have got a rent allowance before these changes will fail to get one now? I would not want even a few cases at the margin to lose their previous entitlement. We must be certain that the figure of £600 is adequate to cover all those who previously received an allowance.
My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Taylor) said earlier that it was excellent that we had the House of Lords to make changes like this.


I should have realised when I made my earlier remarks that it is not quite accurate to say that there is no chance for the Minister to think again about these matters. If the Minister thinks our arguments strong, because of the flexibility of the system we could reject the amendment and ask another place to think again. During that time, the Minister could consult his officials and his noble Friends to see whether there was not some better alternative.
I should like to be assured that this rise to £600 is enough to cover every possible case.

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I do not think that Tory Members have quite recovered from their euphoria at Perth the other week. Having just been told that I am a Left winger, I am now told to accept the thanks of Tory Members for converting my colleagues to Tory policies. Some might agree with that, but they should be consistent.
I can give the hon. Member for Ayr (Mr. Younger) almost a categorical assurance. The domestic increase in revaluations, as distinct from the total increase in revaluations—the hon. Member might be right on that—is 2·9 times. We are therefore erring on the safe side. I have no evidence to show that anyone eligible for a rent allowance under the previous limit will not be covered in future. We are talking about new houses and no one is building new houses for rent except housing associations. I can give an almost categorical assurance that no one will be disadvantaged.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: The Minister said that this provision referred to new houses. We accept that, as we do his estimate that no one will be disadvantaged. But we were inquiring not about people covered by this but about existing tenants of older houses who, under the £200 limit, were eligible for a rent allowance. Can he assure us that nothing in the amendment will mean that anyone living in an ordinary tenement will fail to get a rent allowance in future? I do not think that will happen, but may we have that assurance?
For the avoidance of doubt in Hansard, may I emphasise that when I referred to the Minister as a Left winger, I was trying to be sarcastic?

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: Unfortunately, when people read the speeches of the hon. Member for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Taylor), they do not know whether he is trying to be sarcastic or just silly. Sometimes I am not sure whether he knows himself which hat he has on.
Seriously, I can give the hon. Gentleman the assurance that he seeks. The change to which he referred took place under another piece of legislation. We are dealing with a separate provision about new housing. Therefore, I can give that assurance.

Question put and agreed to.

Lords amendment: No. 11, in page 16, line 47, at end insert—

"The Land Compensation (Scotland) Act 1973 (c. 56)

9A. In section 27 (right to home loss payment where person displaced from dwelling)—
(a) in subsection (1)—
(i) after paragraph (d) there shall be inserted the following paragraph—
(e) a requirement to remove from the building containing the dwelling in pursuance of section 13 of the Building (Scotland) Act 1959 (dangerous buildings) or any other enactment which requires the demolition of the building on account of its condition,":
(ii) at the end of the subsection there shall be added the following paragraph—
(v) where paragraph (e) above applies the authority requiring the removal.";
(b) in subsection (3A)—

(i) after the words "consequence of" there shall be inserted the word "(a)";
(ii) after the word "dwelling" where it second occurs there shall be inserted the words "or; (b) a requirement to remove as mentioned in subsection (1) (e) above";
(iii) at the end of the subsection there shall be added the following words "or removal as the case may be.";

(c) at the end of subsection (9), there shall be added the following words "except that, where the displacement is in consequence of the circumstances referred to in subsection (1) (e) above, it applies if the date of displacement is on or after the coming into force of paragraph 9A of Schedule 2 to the Housing (Financial Provisions) (Scotland) Act 1978.".

9B. In section 34 (disturbance payments for persons without compensatable interests)—
(a) in subsection (1)—
(i) after paragraph (d) there shall be inserted the following paragraph—
(e) a requirement to remove from a building on the land in pursuance of section 13 of the Building (Scotland) Act 1959 (dangerous buildings) or any other enactment which requires the


demolition of the building on account of its condition,";
(ii) at the end of the subsection there shall be added the following paragraph—
(v) where paragraph (e) above applies, the authority requiring the removal.";
(b) in subsection (3)—

(i) for the words "or undertaking as is mentioned in paragraph (b)" there shall be substituted the words "undertaking or requirement to remove as is mentioned in paragraph (b) or (e)";
(ii) for the words "or the undertaking was accepted" there shall be substituted "the undertaking was accepted or he was required to remove.";

(c) in subsection (3A)—

(i) after the words "consequence of" there shall be inserted the word "(a)';
(ii) after the word "building" there shall be inserted the words "or; (a) a requirement to remove as mentioned in subsection (1) (e) above";
(iii) at the end of the subsection there shall be added the following words "or removal as the case may be.";

(d) at the end of subsection (9) there shall be added the following words "except that, where the displacement is in consequence of the circumstances referred to in subsection (1)(e) above, it applies if the date of displacement is on or after the coming into force of paragraph 9B of Schedule 2 to the Housing (Financial Provisions) (Scotland) Act 1978.".

9C. In section 36 (duty to re-house residential occupiers)—
(a) in subsection (1) after paragraph (c) there shall be inserted the following paragraph—
(d) a requirement to remove from the building containing the residential accommodation in pursuance of section 13 of the Building (Scotland) Act 1959 (dangerous buildings), or any other enactment which requires the demolition of the building on account of its condition,";
(b) in subsection (6)—

(i) for the words "or undertaking as is mentioned in paragraph (b)" there shall be substituted "undertaking or requirement as is mentioned in paragraph (b) or (d)";
(ii) for the words "or the undertaking was accepted" there shall be substituted "the undertaking was accepted or he was required to remove."."

10.45 p.m.

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.

Mr. Speaker: Order. I call attention of the House to the fact that privilege is involved in this amendment.

Mr. Brown: This is an important amendment. It arises from an assurance that I gave on Report to my hon. Friend Cook) who tabled a similar amendment at that stage.
I apologise to the House for the length and technicality of the amendment. It gives the right of home loss payments—disturbance payments—to people who have to be rehoused because the property has been declared dangerous. We in this place have been able to draw a distinction in these matters, but the average person who has had to leave his house—this applies mainly to tenements in Edinburgh and Glasgow—have had no rights and have felt that they have had to get out because of some action by a statutory authority.
This is a welcome provision, and I am sure that it will be acceptable to both sides of the House.

Mr. Jim Craigen: Will my hon. Friend indicate whether there is a time limit on these amendments?

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I am not clear what my hon. Friend means by "time limit".

Mr. Craigen: I mean a time limit in respect of the occupancy of a house.

Mr. Brown: I think that I am right in saying that the same arrangements will apply in the event of a building coming down because it is dangerous as apply when it comes down for any other reason. I am not sure whether that is subject to a discretion that is exercised by the local authority. However, I shall clear that point up for my hon. Friend.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: We accept that this is a sensible move because it seems fair and reasonable. In Glasgow in particular there is often a suspicion by some residents in older tenemental property that the dangerous building procedures are used not only because of the compensation considerations but because they provide a speedier way in which the local authority can get action.
In the other place it was indicated that the amendment had been rather rushed. An apology was made for that. It was estimated there that the amendment would cost about £100,000 extra a year.


Was that figure just plucked out of the air on a rushed amendment? If not, how is the £100,000 arrived at? Will that sum fall on the ratepayer, the taxpayer, or both? If so, in what proportion? I have thrown the question at the Minister without notice, so if he would like to answer it through correspondence, I should be happy with that.
The complicated and helpful amendment shows clearly that the other place has played a major part in improving a Bill which left the House of Commons in a messy and inadequate state. Before we finish our proceedings on the amendment I hope that the Minister will be bold enough, even in the presence of the hon. Member for West Stirlingshire (Mr. Canavan), to pay some tribute to the hard work done by the other place in improving this Bill.

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I shall say nothing that will provoke my hon. Friend the Member for West Stirlingshire (Mr. Canavan). The amendment was not rushed. It is rather technical, and therefore we had some problems with it. I do not conceal that.
The figure of £100,000 is to some extent a guess. One or two ingenious authorities have been using powers—quite legitimately—to rehouse people and enable them to make home loss and disturbance payments and then declare the buildings concerned dangerous. In other words, those authorities have found a way round the inadequacy of the existing procedures However, it is unfair to expect authorities to do this. This is what we are trying to clear up.
I cannot tell the hon. Gentleman the break-down. I think that, as usual, it attracts grant or subsidy of over 50 per cent. Some of the burden will obviously fall on the ratepayers. I make no apology for that. It introduces an element of justice for people who have, through no fault of their own, had to leave their homes. I will check up on the details and supply them to the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Younger: There was some talk about this at an earlier stage. It was referred to also in the context of historic buildings, or buildings of architectural merit that might be listed. Would those be covered? If a building were dangerous, it would be necessary for occupants

to move out because of the danger, not merely to them but possibly to people passing in the street, but if the building concerned was of architectural merit it would not be demolished; it would be rehabilitated and rebuilt. There was a celebrated case of this type some years ago in Glasgow.
Would the wording of the amendment exclude from compensation a person who happened to be living in a building which had become dangerous but which, because of its architectural merit, would not be demolished but would be very largely gutted and rebuilt? Possibly the amendment would not cover such a case. I think that everybody intends that it should. Has the Minister thought about this? If not, will he undertake to examine the problem?

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I do not know why I should be so lucky tonight as to be confronted with all these partly hypothetical questions. I do not know the answer to that question, and I shall need to find out. I suspect that the intention is that it should apply. It is a technical point, if somebody has to be removed from his home, whether he will qualify for compenstation even though the building will still be there because it is a historically listed building. As I say, I do not know the answer, but I shall make inquiries and give the hon. Gentleman the information.

Mr. Carmichael: The hon. Member for Ayr (Mr. Younger) raised a very interesting point, but it was a fallacious one. The buildings in Glasgow High Street had been warehouses for about 60 years, so there were no people involved. The hon. Gentleman introduced a red herring.

Question put and agreed to. [Special Entry.]

Lords Amendment: No. 12, in page 20, line 20, leave out "but".

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Oscar Murton): With this we may take Lords Amendment No. 13.

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: On these amendments, which are purely drafting, I defy even the hon. Member for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Taylor) to get a debate.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: It might be wise for us to return this amendment to the House of Lords. Their lordships have made a mistake. I think that the Minister will agree that a mistake has been made. It is proposed to delete "but" from line 36, on page 20, but the wrong word has been taken out; it should be "locality", in line 37. I challenge the Minister to say what relevance the locality of a house has to the question whether it is in a good state of repair.
Are we prepared to pass legislation saying that the Government expect different standards of repair to apply to different localities? We accept that there are dfferent standards of repair, bearing in mind the age and character of a house. If one lives in an old house, as I do, one does not expect it to have the same standard of repair as a spanking new house such as that in which I am sure the hon. Member for West Stirlingshire (Mr. Canavan) will live.
On the other hand, surely one does not accept that there should be different standards of repair according to the locality of the house. Surely one should accept that standards of repair should be at the same level throughout Scotland, and that the Government should not consider specifying an area as a housing action area because of the locality.
I suggest to the Minister that it might be wise to send this amendment back to the House of Lords. I think that it is simple mistake in a drafting amendment. The proposal is to take out the word "but", instead of the word "locality".

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I rather suspect that the hon. Member is on the wrong amendment. I have had a quick and cursory look at the Bill, and I think that the amendment as printed is correct. The word "locality" is in the next line. We are debating the word "but".

Mr. Taylor: I have been trying to explain that the amendment is to take out the word "but" in line 36, and that what was intended was to take out not that word, which does not add or subtract a great deal, but a different word in the next line. I am sorry to criticise what has happened. I think that, by and large, the Lords have done a good job in improving the Bill, but I am sure you will agree, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that in this case the other place has proposed an

amendment which does not add a great deal to the sense of it. In those circumstances the Minister might accept that it would be wise to suggest to the Lords that they should have another look at the amendment to see whether they have not picked the wrong word in the wrong line.

Mr. Hugh D. Brown: I apologise most humbly to the House and to the hon. Member for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Taylor). I should have known that he would be able to create a debate out of anything or nothing. The amendments are correct. They are clear in their intent, and they are purely drafting to delete the word "but" in two places.

Question put and agreed to.

Lords Amendments Nos. 13 and 14 agreed to.

Orders of the Day — FIREMEN (WORKING HOURS)

Motion made, and Question proposed. That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Frank R. White.]

10.57 p.m.

Mr. Robert Hughes: I am grateful for the opportunity to raise a very important and serious matter, namely, the difficulties in the implementation of the 42-hour week agreement for the fire services, due to come into force in November this year. This matter was first raised with me in March by the Aberdeen secretary of the Fire Brigades Union, Mr. Ian Davidson, and I am grateful to him and glad that he alerted me to the problems.
I do not intend, in view of the time available, to go into the origins and history of the strike, beyond saying that it arose because of a deep sense of frustration and, in my view, a justifiable grievance over the pay and conditions of service.
Again, I do not intend to go into the events of the strike itself, except to say that during the period that it lasted the nation was extremely fortunate that the loss of life and damage to property were not greater than they might have been. For that we owe a debt of gratitude both to the Service men who attempted to provide fire protection cover and to individual members of the Fire Brigades


Union who, even though on strike, were extremely helpful in many cases.
In the discussions and negotiating sessions before and during the strike it was clear that the reduction in the working hours, without loss of pay, was an important part of the FBU claim. Indeed, before the strike started the FBU was urged to call off the strike and to continue negotiations on its claim for a shorter working week.
In the event, the strike took place, and agreement was reached in January. The National Joint Council for Local Authorities' Fire Brigades sent out a circular signed by both secretaries, Mr. B. J. Rusbridge on behalf of the employers and Mr. T. Parry on behalf of the union, setting out in full the 10-point settlement.
Item 4 of that settlement had this to say:
Agreement was registered in principle to introduce for firemen, leading firemen and sub-officers a 42-hour week without loss of pay from November 1978 subject to the satisfactory completion of negotiations. Both sides recognise the many problems associated with the introduction into the fire brigade of a shorter working week and agree that on the resumption of normal working immediate negotiations shall commence within the NJC.
From that it is clear that there were two definite commitments. One was to begin the 42-hour working week in November. The other was an unequivocal commitment to start immediate negotiations within the NJC. What is causing concern to firemen and to all of us who want to see good industrial relations and the preservation of an adequate fire service is the total failure of the employers either to begin negotiations or to enable to begin the recruitment and training of the additional firemen needed to implement the agreement.
It is staggering to reflect that, four months after the signing of the agreement, the employers are still insisting on further studies on the methods of introducing the 42-hour week before meaningful negotiation can commence. All that has so far happened is that the employers have made known their first thinking, and their first thinking is certainly not very constructive.
It is not as though this was something suddenly sprung on the employers, something which they had never heard of before, on which there was no previous

preparation. In fact, investigations into the prospect of reducing firemen's working hours began almost three years ago following, or during, an earlier industrial dispute. As a result of that, there was a Home Office inquiry set up into the feasibility of what was then thought of as a 40-hour week in the fire service.
That inquiry reported in September 1977. Having taken evidence from each of the fire authorities, having looked at the evidence, the technical details, the financial details and the practical details, and concluding that it was essential to maintain the existing level of fire cover, the Home Office working party finally came to the conclusion that the best method of achieving a shorter working week was to go for a 42-hour week, not the 40-hour week.
It is clear from all the evidence which was taken that there is a great deal of information available on the practicability of the 42-hour week—information which the employing authorities and their advisers themselves provided—so there can be no excuse for prevarication and failure to honour a solemn and binding agreement. Clearly, doubts must exist about the good faith of the employers and whether they intend to meet their side of the bargain.
In fact, I go further and say that the employers are now in breach of both the spirit and the letter of the agreement. I appreciate that that is a serious charge to make, but I make it having studied the facts in detail.
If there was any hope of meeting the target of 7th November 1978, recruitment and training should by now have started. In fact, the opposite is the case. The employers' side of the NJC has advised local fire brigades—I have had this confirmed in answer to a Question—that
for the time being it would be unwise to recruit in anticipation of the shorter working week.
In other words, this is a directive not to recruit.
What possible reason can there be for such inaction? In answer to a Question on 9th December, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said that to reduce the working hours from 48 to 42 an estimated 3,000 to 5,000 additional firemen would be needed for the whole


country. It takes 12 weeks for a fireman's basic training, and standards are necessarily high. It is therefore self-evident that, even if one takes the lower figure of 3,000, they could not all be trained at the same time and training would have to be phased over a period.
Again, I ask what possible reason there can be for not recruiting. It cannot be that negotiations on work practices have to be finalised before recruiting can begin, because nothing in the basic training of a fireman can affect those negotiations or be affected by them.
It cannot be that money is not available for the training and subsequent employment of trained firemen. I understand that one cannot take people on for training and then say to them "Go away till November, then come back, and we shall give you a job." The fact is that at present the brigades in Britain are about 1,500 men short of recruitment to meet the present establishment for the 48-hour week, and finance is available now through the rate support grant to cover these numbers. So a recruitment drive should have begun. Publicity to encourage men to join the fire service is already long overdue. For the employers to insist on further studies—I repeat—must raise doubts as to their good faith in the minds of most reasonable people.
It must be remembered that the agreement finally reached did not meet with the universal approval of FBU members. The executive committee had to work hard for its acceptance. It is not surprising, given the course of events, that there is concern, anxiety and even anger at the delaying tactics of the employers. Nor is this confined to the ranks of the FBU. When the circumstances were reported to the TUC, the general secretary, Len Murray, issued a statement on 10th May, in which he said:
There is not the slightest doubt that the provision of a 42-hour week for firemen formed an important part of the settlement which ended the firemen's strike. In the discussions which took place during the dispute, the Fire Brigades Union and the TUC certainly regarded this as an integral part of the settlement, as did the Government itself. It is now four months since the end of the strike, when immediate negotiations were promised to achieve a detailed agreement on the introduction of the 42-hour week. It is a matter of serious concern—even astonishment to me—that to date no firm proposals have been put foward by the local authorities. These employers clearly have a responsibility

to speed up action to honour their obligation to bring in the 42-hour week by this November, especially in view of the Government's undertaking to provide the necessary finance for this long overdue form.
That statement admirably sums up the position, and I believe that we now need clear and urgent action from the Government as to what can be done to remedy the unfortunate situation which now arises.
I understand that the Government are not directly the employer and that negotiations are a matter for both sides in the NJC, but I trust that the Government will accept their responsibilities, for the following reasons. First, the Home Office feasibility study finally proposed the 42-hour week as practicable. Second, the tripartite talks persuaded the employers to include point 4 in the offer, which finally led to a settlement. Third, the Government undertook to underwrite the settlement.
I therefore ask the following assurances tonight: do the Government stand by their commitment to provide the financial resources to cover the cost? Do the Government accept that the agreement is binding on the employers? Will the Government take steps to persuade or compel, if necessary—the employers to begin negotiations and to start a recruitment campaign immediately?
I believe that, even now, given good will and a sense of urgency, substantial progress can be made to meet the target date of 7th November, if not in every brigade, in many areas of the country.
The firemen came through their first-ever national strike with remarkably little bitterness. Should the agreement not be implemented, disillusion and anger will be great, and this will have very serious repercussions for industrial relations in the fire service for the future.
If, because of the intransigence of the employers, we are left without fire cover in November, the responsibility for the loss of life and damage to property will lie fairly and squarely on their shoulders. I urge my hon. Friend to act decisively to avoid that possibility.

11.8 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Dr. Shirley Summerskill): My hon. Friend the Member for


Aberdeen, North (Mr. Hughes) has raised tonight a matter of the greatest importance to the smooth and efficient working of the fire service, which is, I know, causing a great deal of anxiety in the ranks of the service. I welcome this opportunity to clarify the position if I can, and, particularly at the outset, two of the issues which are fundamental to a better understanding of the matter.
First, responsibility for determining the pay and conditions of service of firemen, including the length of their working week, rests with individual fire authorities. Central negotiations are, however, conducted in the National Joint Council for Local Authorities' Fire Brigades, on which the fire authorities and the fire service staff organisations are represented. The Home Office is not represented on the national joint council, and my right hon. Friend has no power to enforce, by regulations, the rates of pay and conditions of service upon which negotiations take place in the national joint council.
Secondly, it is important to be clear about the terms of that part of the agreement relating to a reduced working week which was reached by both sides of the national joint council in January, following which the Fire Brigades Union agreed to return to normal working and the firemen's strike came to an end. The relevant part of the agreement reads as follows:
Agreement is registered in principle to introduce for firemen, leading firemen and sub-officers, a 42 hour working week without loss of pay from November 1978 subject to satisfactory completion of negotiations. Both sides recognise the many problems associated with the introduction into the fire service of a shorter working week and agree that on resumption of normal working immediate negotiations shall commence within the NJC
The Government's attitude towards a reduced working week in the fire service was made clear in guidance which was given to the NJC both before, and during, the firemen's strike. The guidance given by the Government on 3rd November 1977 was as follows:
The Government recognises that there is a long standing claim for a reduction in the 48 hour working week of the fire service and would now be prepared for a reduction in working hours to be negotiated. The reduction could not be implemented before the autumn of 1978, although preparations could begin before then.

Detailed arrangements on costs and other aspects of the reduction would be matters for negotiation.
During the firemen's strike further guidance was given on 8th December 1977, which, after dealing with the establishment of a pay formula, went on to say:
The Government hopes that negotiations will also continue in the NJC on the reduction of the 48 hour week. If a shorter working week is to be introduced without loss of pay this would have to be the basis of more productive working routines which permitted a more cost effective use of the time not spent on firefighting.
If I may go back in time, I should like to make it clear that the Government had earlier given very careful thought to the feasibility of a reduced working week in the fire service. In September 1977, the Home Office had sent to the two sides of the NJC the report of an inquiry into the feasibility of a 40-hour week. The report, which came down in favour of a 42-hour week, followed detailed examination of this question by a team of officials over the preceding two years.
On 10th January 1978, the employers registered with the employees' side of the NJC their intention to raise, during the negotiations on the introduction of the shorter week, all aspects of the 42-hour week, among which would be the schedules of work and shift systems as applied to firemen; the achievement of the most productive working routines; and the most cost-effective use and deployment of manpower, including the use of the time not spent on fire-fighting.
A meeting of both sides of the NJC was held on 23rd February, at which a preliminary exchange of views took place on the introduction of the 42-hour week. I understand that the employers' side outlined its objectives and its intention of pursuing its investigations into the 42-hour week with the greatest possible despatch, but said that, because of the amount of work to be done and the delayed start arising from the fire service dispute, there was doubt whether negotiations on the 42-hour week could be brought to a point where there was agreement on satisfactory terms in time for its introduction in November 1978. I understand that at this meeting the employees' side, not unnaturally, expressed its concern and said that it did not see that a review of all


aspects of the efficiency of the service as proposed by the employers was relevant to the 42-hour week.
In order to determine their approach to the negotiations on the introduction of a 42-hour week, the local authority associations and the employers' side of the NJC have embarked on a thorough and comprehensive study. They have formed a combined working party to define their objectives and the means to attain them, and have issued detailed questionnaires to fire authorities. Regional meetings have been held throughout the country. The association and the employers regard it as their duty to ensure that the fire service, based on a 42-hour week, should operate to the highest standards of efficiency. This has involved the working party in a thorough examination of the task of the fire service, which it considered had widened considerably in recent years, and of the resources required to meet that task. Against this background, the employers' side of the NJC informed all fire authorities on 27th February that there would be the fullest consultation with them as developments proceeded, but that for the time being it would be unwise for authorities to recruit in anticipation of the reduced working week.
In view of his central responsibilities for the fire service, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has seen both sides in the negotiations with the object of trying to bridge the differences between them, so that negotiations might proceed as quickly and as smoothly as possible. He remains in close touch with them and is prepared to see them at any time if this will help. The Fire Brigades Union's understandable concern is that the wide-ranging review which the employers' side and the local authority associations are undertaking before substantive negotiations can begin will make it impossible for a 42-hour week to be introduced from November this year.
Representatives of the employers' side have told my right hon. Friend that they intend to look at matters which they believe to be important to the future efficiency of the fire service. They acknowledge, however, that fire cover and manning levels are not matters for the NJC but ones on which my right hon. Friends the Secretaries of State give guidance to fire authorities and on which they

are advised by the central fire brigades advisory councils. My right hon. Friend's concern is that there should be a professional and efficient fire service and that negotiations should proceed in the NJC with the minimum of delay consistent with achieving this object. To this end, he has made clear to the national joint council that any assistance which the Home Office can properly provide will be quickly forthcoming.
Both sides of the NJC met again on 14th April. I understand that at this meeting the employers said that they would not be ready to begin negotiations until they had examined all the issues—and that this would not be until the end of May or beginning of June. The employers gave the Fire Brigades Union some indication of their general views. They said that the 42-hour week would have to be introduced in such a way that it promoted a more committed attitude by firemen to the service, that they were looking for an end to practices which limited the effective use and deployment of manpower, and that a national agreement on the introduction of a 42-hour week would have to be more closely defined than had been past practice, with local discretion operating within nationally defined limits.
In addition, the employers told the Fire Brigades Union that their preliminary views were that a 42-hour week should operate on a three-shift duty system, that they were examining the tasks which, in addition to fire-fighting and rescue work, firemen should be prepared to undertake, that all duty days, including weekends and public holidays, should be operative on the same working routine, that there should be a nationally defined stand-down period at night with all other hours, other than meal breaks, available for work, and that there should be a national definition of shift systems for variable and day manning systems, and freedom for fire authorities to introduce such systems as were necessary.
My right hon. Friend met the national executive council of the FBU again last week. It told him of its continuing and increasing concern about the lack of progress towards the 42-hour week and explained that its experience in attempting to negotiate with the employers had led it to call for a nationalised fire service. My


right hon. Friend made it clear then and I make it clear now that the Government remain committed to their desire to see the agreement which ended the recent dispute put into effect.
With regard to pay, that agreement guaranteed the firemen a substantial and proper increase in pay, the next stage of which will be payable in November this year, under a formula which will maintain the firemen's rightful place in the community in the years ahead. The introduction of the 42-hour week in the fire service is undoubtedly an important step forward in the conditions of service of firemen, but it calls for the detailed consideration of a number of matters. It is understandable that the employers should wish to look at expenditure on fire service manpower and the return which is given for that money. But it is equally understandable that the Fire Brigades Union should view with concern what it considers to be a lack of progress so far on substantive negotiations for the introduction of the 42-hour week.
The concern of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland is for the well-being of the fire service in the national interest. The negotiations on the introduction of the 42-hour week are a matter for the two sides of the national joint council, the employers and the employees. The employers' side has undertaken to put detailed proposals to the employees' side at a meeting of the NJC on 2nd June. We hope that both sides will approacch that meeting determined that the negotiations shall be constructive and fruitful. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary made clear during the fire service dispute the Government's view on the 42-hour week and hopes that progress towards that end will be made.

Mr. Robert Hughes: By leave of the House; my hon. Friend has not answered the point and given me the three assurances that I sought. Will she now get the employers together and ensure that recruiting starts now? Why cannot recruiting start, given the existing shortage of firemen on current establishment? Such a move would be a gesture of good faith. Why does she not insist that the employers carry out that part of the bargain? The bargain is binding and should

be met. Will she say that the Government will meet their responsibility of seeing that the agreement is kept in full without any further delay or prevarication?

Dr. Summerskill: As I hope I pointed out in my speech, this matter is one for the two sides of the joint council. They must negotiate and reach an agreement. The employers' side has undertaken to put proposals to the employees' side on 2nd June. We must wait until then. My right hon. Friend can only reiterate his hope that progress towards a 42-hour week will be made then.

11.23 p.m.

Mr. Norman Buchan: Will my hon. Friend convey to her right hon. Friend and, through him, to the employers the increasing anxiety of hon. Members on all sides over what now appears to be intransigence on the part of local authorities? I was staggered to hear the list of requirements that the employers outlined at their meeting in April. This looks like an attempt to postpone events in the hope that, in the meantime, a shift in the political power will take place. Large numbers of hon. Members are anxious about this, as well as those who are concerned with the union. I hope that my hon. Friend will ensure that the views of the House are conveyed to the local authorities.

11.24 p.m.

Mr. Dennis Canavan: Is it not a fact that part of the reason for this intransigence on the part of the employers' side of the NJC is that it appears to be overloaded with Tory representatives, jealous of the intervention of a Labour Government leading to a settlement? Are they not now deliberately trying to build up the intransigence so as to be awkward and embarrass the Government and the Fire Brigades Union? Will the Minister take the appropriate action, since this behaviour is disgraceful? The union is fed up with it. It appears that there are far too many Right-wing Tory reactionaries from Tory-controlled local authorities who are not keen on introducing the 42-hour week as soon as possible.

Mr. George Younger: Will the Under-Secretary of State put the record straight and confirm that the employers are acting with complete propriety, as they have throughout the whole matter,


in accordance with the advice of the Department? Such charges should not be left unanswered. Will the hon. Lady make her position clear?

Dr. Summerskill: The debate has been useful because it has served for hon. Members to give their opinions on this matter. They are entitled to do so. The speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Hughes) will be read carefully by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and by members of the Fire Brigades Union, some of whom are in attendance. I am sure that the employers will be reading the comments that have been made.

11.25 p.m.

Mr. Neil Carmichael: My hon. Friend said that the employers were behaving properly. However, as my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Hughes) said, there was not only the letter but the spirit of the agreement. Now that the debate has taken place, I think that those outside the House will feel that that spirit has not been honoured by the local authorities. The spirit has not been adhered to, whatever word-splitting or word-shaving has taken place. There is great disappointment among my hon. Friends.

11.26 p.m.

Mr. James Sillars: When the agreement that ended the dispute was finalised a clause was inserted, at the insistence of the employers, that there be no recrimination in terms of members of the Fire Brigades Union. From what we have heard this evening it is clear that there is recrimination on the part of the employers towards the men involved in the dispute. The conditions that they are now trying to impose in respect of the 42-hour week would not have been acceptable to the specially reconvened conference of the Fire Brigades Union. It is incumbent upon the Government to lean as heavily as possible on the employers to ensure that there is even-handedness on the issue of no recrimination.

Mr. Bruce Douglas-Mann: Further to that point—

The Question having been proposed after Ten o'clock and the debate having continued for half an hour, Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Adjourned at twenty-seven minutes past Eleven o'clock.